Be free from the bondage of desire - this is the refrain in the Ramayana, the Mahabharata, the Bhagavatha, the Bible, the Quoran, and all the scriptures of mankind.

Each religion exhorts those who are attracted by it to meditate on God in certain Form known by a certain Name; but, one who is aware that He is all Names and all Forms will adopt a sound which is profoundly significant, which summarises all Names, namely, the Pranava (OM) sound, the akshara (unchanging, indestructible). Through the changing to the unchanging, that is the journey.

There are three steps or stages in this journey. "I am Yours," You are Mine," and "I am You." Every sadhaka has to walk from one to the other, and reach the journey's end. Move on, don't halt. Religion is three-fourths character. No person can claim to be religious if he merely observes the sacraments and rules, and fails to be upright and compassionate. Character alone can harden one to the blows of pain and pleasure.

Faith in God being within the heart, faith in His constant presence and constant guidance - these will confer courage, virtue, and illumination. The Sastras say, have faith in the doctor, so that you may get cured of illness; have faith in the mantra with which the preceptor initiates you, for then alone can your sadhana be fruitful; have faith in the sacredness of the temple, for then alone is your pilgrimage profitable; have faith in the astrologer's predictions, for, without it, why bother yourselves with him and his abracadabra? Have faith in the Guru, for then alone will your steps be steady and firm, on the path to Self-realisation. Faith in the Guru should bring faith in the Atma, the Self.

The Guru extolled therein is the sage who has transcended name and form and is beyond the effect of the three gunas or attributes; guru is neither good nor bad; neither passionate nor dull; neither enthusiastic nor uninterested. He is unaffected, calm, content. He is the Atma, having realised that the Atma is the One and Only. He makes you cast off the fear of death and birth, he renders you fit for the vision of the eternal absolute Truth.

If you do not come across such preceptors, do not get downhearted; pray for guidance and from your own heart you will receive the Gita that you need from the Charioteer who is there. The Gita says, "Pandits (the learned) see Brahman in the scholar, the sage, the venerable and the venerator, the cow, the elephant, the dog and the eater of canine flesh." (Such Pandiths are very rare on the face of the earth; people claim to be Pandiths on the basis of the scholarship they parade, not the vision they have won).

Veerabhadhra Sastra described very realistically the childhood pranks of Krishna and explained their significance. There was the scene of Krishna's dance on the head of the Kaliya a huge big serpent, full of poison, rolling in death and destruction. Krishna saw the carcasses of animals which had died when they inhaled the poisoned air, near the Kaliya pool; birds had fallen dead on the ground. Nothing green could survive in the neighbourhood. As soon as Krishna jumped into the pool to save the region from the serpent's havoc, his companions ran horne to bring the parents, so that they could intercede and stop the foolish pranks of their mischievous son. As He had no vishaya (objective desires) and so visha (poison) could not affect Him.

Kaliya is the representative of human, rolling in sensory objects, poison so far as its effect on life is concerned. Vishaya (sensory object) is the most deadly visha (poison). When Krishna danced on the head of Kaliya, the poison was all vomitted. And the serpent was subdued.
 

When God is revered, the world and all its poisonous fumes recede and you are restored to original health.

The Lord and lust cannot be together. How then could the gopees have any body-consciousness, when they adored Krishna?
 

Krishna had already announced His Glory to the cowherd maidens by such divine miracles, as the uplifting of the mountain Govardhanagiri. He had manifested the Universe in His mouth and showed that He had come on a Divine Mission to destroy the wicked and save the good. (Avatars choose the time and the mode of announcement of their advent and their Glory).

The gopees knew the secret passage to the heart of the Lord and they realised Him quick and fast. The Gita says that if you give up all Dharma and take refuge in Him alone, then He will save you from sin and wipe your tears. Giving up Dharma does not mean that you can bid farewell to virtue and righteous action; it means, you have to give up the egoism that you are the 'doer,' be confirmed in the faith that He is the 'doer' of every deed.That is the genuine 'giving up.'

You have heard that Krishna is Murali-Madhava,(Madhava - the Lord of the Universe) and what exactly is the murali? You must be the murali (the flute). Let the breath of Krishna pass through you, making delightful music that melts the hearts. Surrender yourself to Him; become hollow, egoless, desireless; then, He will Himself come and pick you up caressingly and apply you - the flute - to His lips and blow His sweet breath through you. Allow Him to play whatever song He likes. Even objective desires will be transmuted into higher spheres of purity when one approaches the Lord. Nothing against Dharma can stand the presence of the Lord. That fire will consume all impurities.

Sanctify every word and deed by filling it with Prema of Krishna or whatever Name and Form you give to the Lord you love. The gold of which an anklet was made, can become the gold for a crown on the head of a temple image; only it has to be melted in the crucible and beaten into shape. The waters of the river might be dirty; but, the bhaktha who sips it with a mantra or a sacred sound or prayer on his lips, transmutes it into a sacred sanctified water. The body becomes healthy by exercise and work; the mind becomes healthy by Upasana (devout contemplation) and Namasmarana (remembrance of the Divine), by regular, well-planned discipline, joyfully accepted and joyfully carried out.

All your life, you must be Love, with Love, for Love. That is to say, love expressed through service to those that draw that love from you, and by drawing, help to increase it and deepen it. Spiritual discipline is designed to canalise that love, so that it may irrigate the heart, which will otherwise go dry.

Love must be many-stranded in order to be strong and tough. A single strand, is too weak. Have it many-stranded, one towards the mother, another towards the father, others strands towards husband, wife, friend, son, daughter, etc. of course Love is all-embracing, it cannot be confined to one item and denied to, another. It is a current that flows over all meditation on the Lord and His Love will help you to tap it from the depths of your heart. And, if there be righteousness in the heart, there will be beauty in the character; if there is beauty in the character, there will be harmony in the home; if there be harmony in the home, there will be order in the nation; if there be order in the nation, there will be peace in the world.

(Injury inflicted on any being is sacrilege, self-injury. Love is transformed into poison if hate contaminates it. Love some, but do not hate the rest. Love comes automatically to the realised soul; but, the spiritual aspirant has to cultivate it by means of service and inquiry into the unity of the Atma).

There is no living being without the spark of love; even a mad human loves something or somebody intensely. But, you must-recognise this love as but a reflection of the Premaswaruupa (the embodiment of Love), that is your reality, of the God who is residing in your heart. Without that spring of Love that bubbles in your heart, you will not be prompted to love at all.

However superfine the paper, however artistic the envelope, however poetic the composition of the letter, it will not reach the addressee by post when it lacks the stamp! So too, the trappings, vestures, shawls, robes, and rosaries are ineffective; they cannot reach the addressee, God. What will take their prayers to the addressee is the 20 paise stamp - dedication or bhakthi.

So the Upanishads designate the Divine power as the Brahma* Tatwa or Atma*Tatwa (Principle of the Supreme Absolute Reality or Chit Sakti or Constant Integrated Awareness/Consciousness). The Upanishads further declare that it is due to the effulgence of Brahman that the world shines and that there is no effulgence in the Universe which can illuminate Brahman. It is the light of Brahman that enables the eyes to see all things except Brahman. The mind is able to function because of the light of Brahman, but it cannot grasp or describe Brahman i.e. Atma. This all-powerful Atmic Principle resides in every human being in subtle form. (Human is not able to recognise this Divine power because human is preoccupied with utilizing the physical and mental faculties for the acquisition of wealth and worldly goods).

The Kenopanishad deals with this question and points out that this Divine power is the life of our life, the mind of our mind, the eye of our eye, the ear of our ear, the speech of our speech, because it is the motivating, coordinating and illuminating principle underlying all such organs of the human personality. All the organs of our body are animated or motivated by the divine Atmic power inside, thereby enabling them to discharge their respective functions.

Bear in mind what the Kenopanishad also taught to the celestial beings, the sages and other human beings. It taught them about the inexorable, immutable and inescapable law of Karma, duly stressing the fact that the results of good or bad actions are not like the milk that you get immediately as you draw it from the udder of a milch cow, but they are like the fruits that you get from a tree long after the seed is planted. Therefore, don't feel elated just because your bad actions have not given you the bad results immediately; you are sure to experience them in due course.

One meaning of Karma which is popularly accepted as one's destiny, or fate, the inescapable "writing" on the brow, which has to work itself out. There is no escaping from it. But people forget that it is not written by some other hand. It is all written by one's own hand. And the hand that wrote it can also wipe it off.

The husk, with which the paddy is born, can be removed by effort; the Maya (worldly illusory power) which persuaded you to write all that destiny can be conquered in an instant and then, the entire page can be wiped away.

Human is not aware of the grand goal of the pilgrimage. Human is straying into wrong roads which lead towards disaster. Human puts faith in outside things and plans to derive joy, from and through them. But all joys spring only from the spring that is inside. Human only envelopes the outer things with own joy and then, experiences it as though from that other thing - that is all.
 

Only a patient ailing from a disease is entitled to the specific which will cure it. What business have others with it? What profit can they draw from it? The Gita will act on the mental system only when the symptoms of grief are strong.

Anyone anywhere who reaches the stage of spiritual surrender (as Arjuna reached) will get the response from Krishna and He will teach the Gita from the chariot which is driven by Him, that is Arjuna's own heart.

The purpose of the Gita is to remove the delusion which overwhelmed Arjuna and made him feel that he was the doer, whereas the truth is, he was but an instrument. So Krishna asks him at the very end of the discourse, "Has the delusion born out of ajnana (ignorance) been fully destroyed in you?" For, like a good teacher, Krishna is evidently quite willing to resort to some other means or to discourse a little longer, in order to make the pupil understand the teaching. But Arjuna is a good student; he declares, "Destroyed is the delusion I have gained recognition." Now what is the recognition he has gained? The recognition of the Self or Atma. He has seen himself as basically Atma, and he has seen the world and all objects as superimpositions on the Atma, due to ignorance or Maya.

A person walked on the beach played with the waves, and had a dip in the water; his feet are wet. There is no miracle in this. This is what happens to many a scholar who wades in the sea of the Gita. The Pandith may have great pomp before others but to himself, in the secrecy of own conscience, he/she is a small human being indeed. Greatness depends upon the sadhana (spiritual discipline) and the success achieved in it, in practice of spiritual austerities and in firm adherence to it.

"Awake, arise and stop not till the goal is reached," it is said. But one need not march towards the goal. It is not some place where you have to go. It is jura the opening of the eye, the removal of the veil, the waking from the dream, the lighting of the light of spiritual wisdom.

There are people who argue that the Gita teaches yoga more than any other; that shows only their partisan nature. The Gita is the greatest harmoniser of all yogas. Once the Gita is made the guiding star, the way you act will be Karma Yoga, the way you feel will be Bhakthi Yoga, the way you reason will be Jnana Yoga. It will become automatically so. What you do must be in line with Dharma; what you feel must foster Prema; what you think must reveal Sathyam.

Through bodha (knowledge, teaching) alone can Dharma be saved in the modern Kali Age. When you scatter seeds on the surface of the soil, they do not germinate. You have to keep them inside the soil. So too, bodha, if it is scattered on the surface, it will not germinate, grow into the tree of knowledge and yield the fruit of wisdom.

The Vedas and Sastras, since they were won by penance and travail by sages and seers who were interested in the welfare of humanity and the liberation of individual are the greatest repositories. Know that the basic reality is God, Omnipotent, Omniscient, Omnipresent. Become aware of it and stay in that awareness always. Whatever the stress and the storm, do not waver from that faith. By means of any one of His Names, any Name that is fragrant with Divine Perfume, any Name that is reminiscent of His Beauty. His Grace, and His power.

Realisation of that reality can come only to the aspirant who deserves it. Arjuna had reached the highest stage of surrender when the teaching started and during the process, he had unexcelled concentration. No wonder he was blessed.

Let the pretty wishes for which you now approach God be realised or not, let the plans for promotion and progress which you place before God, be fulfilled or not; they are not so important after all. The primary aim should be to become Masters or yourselves, to hold intimate and constant: communion with the Divine that is in you as well as in the Universe of which you are a part. But individual who has emerged from God, is an embodiment of love. Instead of limiting love within narrow confines, human should extend it to all and thereby make the life purposeful and worthy.

There is an example from the Mahabharata to illustrate this situation. Because of Sri Krishna's grace, all the Pandava brothers survived the Kurukshetra war. All the hundred Kaurava brothers died in the war. Seeing the plight of Gandhari, not one of whose sons had survived the war, people blamed Krishna for such a calamity. Krishna went to Gandhari to console her. On seeing Krishna, she burst out in anger: "Krishna! Being Divine, should you exhibit such favouritism?
 

Could you not have saved at least one of my sons?" Smilingly Krishna replied: "Mother! Did you set your eyes on even one of your sons? When you yourself did not choose to cast your eyes on your sons, how do you expect God to look at them?" (Gandhari had blindfolded herself from the time of her marriage to her blind husband, Dhritarashtra, and had never removed the bandage out of devotion to her husband).

Life is not a simple affair; it is not governed by uniform laws which can be discovered and applied. Twice two may not always be four, in life, though it may be so in arithmetic. Each one has own strength and weakness, foibles and fears; skills and handicaps, and so no one prescription can be suggested for all. One day is sunny, but, the next may be rainy. One person may come upon a treasure while walking on a road; the person behind on the same road may lose purse and all that person possessed. Each one must proceed from the place where one is, at own pace, according to own light. But, if each has caught a glimpse of the Atmic Reality, of the source from which he/she has emerged and the goal into which he/she is to merge, then all will reach the goal of the journey, sooner or later. Once that glimpse is received either through grace or through a Guru or through some other means, the fascination for the body and the senses which dominate it, and the world which feeds the senses, the fascination for the vainglorious adventures in search of fame and fortune, will become meaningless and will fade away.

No object in the world of Maya can be without a creator. Here is a loud-speaker. Someone must have produced it. For everything which human enjoys in daily life there is a creator. But we are also seeing objects which are beyond human capacity. The stars which twinkle in the sky demonstrate their existence. The glory of the Sun and the Moon which illumine the world is also visible to us. The supreme power which has the capacity to create such marvellous things has been described by the Vedhas as Aprameya, which means, one who is beyond all proofs and all limitations. He cannot be described in words. The primary object of human must be to seek to understand this Infinite Power.
 

To recognise the Creator, there are certain criteria. There are three types of evidence determining the existence of a thing. The first is direct perception, the second is inference, the third is the authority of revealed scriptures.
 

We generally consider direct perception as the most important type of evidence. We are able to see how many hands we have, how many legs we have, how many eyes, and so on. We boil milk and add some curd to it at night and the next morning find that the milk has turned into curd. For the conversion of milk to curd, our own action provides the direct proof. The evidence of our own eyes is enough to convince us about how the change from milk to curd has occurred.
 

Inference is another form of proof. We see smoke on the top of a distant hill. We infer from the smoke that there must be a fire on the hill. Although we see only the smoke, we infer that there is fire. To infer the existence of the "unseen" from the presence of what is "seen" is inferential proof.

But these methods of determining facts are applicable only to the external universe. We cannot understand what is meant by Atma. For determining the Divine Principle we must depend only on the Vedas. When the Divine is described as without attributes, eternal, ever-existing, pure, free, and self-effulgent, this description will not make the Brahman (Atma, Infinite Power) visible to us. You cannot grasp God. He can only be experienced in the heart.

What all you see is Divine. What you eat is Divine. The air you breathe is Divine. Your nature is Divine; what has happened is that delusion has covered it with dirt. The washerman does not make your clothes white; it is white already; what he does is to manifest its whiteness by removing the dirt that has hidden the genuine native colour, white.

One of the first equipment that is necessary for the Brahmachaari (young spiritual aspirant) is a rigorous self-examination. In scriptures has described the ceremony of Brahmopadesam (Upanayanam) which means, "taking near," taking Brahmachaari near Brahman, introducing him/her to desire to know Brahman, the path of Brahman. It is one of the Samskaras (purificatory acts), rites which reconstruct the personality, reform the mind, purify it and rebuild it. It makes the person receiving it a Dwija (a twice born). The person is born first into the world; now, he/she is born into the Sadhaka world and becomes a person who walks towards Brahman.

The initiation was done by the Upadesham (instruction) of the Gayatri Mantra - a Universal Prayer that can be used by people of all climes and creeds. It calls upon the Glorious Power that pervades the Sun and the three worlds to arouse, awaken and strengthen the Intelligence, so that it may lead to intense Sadhana and Sadhana may lead to success.

The Brahmachaari has vowed him/herself into a life of spiritual discipline. What are the requisites for the discipline?

First: Faith, that can stand the ridicule of the ignorant, the cavilling by the worldly, the laughter of the low-minded.

Second: Do not worry about ups and downs, loss or gain, joy or grief. You are yourself the maker of the ups and downs. If you but care, it can all be one smooth level. You crave for a thing and when you get it, you call it joy; when you don't, you call it grief. Cut the craving off, and there will be no more swinging from joy to grief.

Third: Reason out and get convinced of the truth, All is Brahman i.e. Atma. He is all-pervading, even more than ether or anything more pervasive than that. His nature is beyond all human vocabulary, beyond all human mathematics. Have this conviction well stabilised in your intellect.

Fourth: Be steady in spiritual practice, and never hesitate once you have decided on it.

People crave for peace and happiness but they do things which can only bring unhappiness and worry. You are essentially sparks from the Divine, but like sparks coming from a furnace which after a time turn into ash, you are forgetting your divine origin. While pursuing your education for worldly purposes, you should also pursue the spiritual discipline, which will lead you to the Divine.

The number of students in schools and colleges is sky rocketing. We proclaim that formal education, which was for long the privilege, of a few scholars and the sons of the rich, is now provided at the very doors of everyone. We rejoice when schools and colleges rise up more and more in every country of the world, without realising that what is happening through them is the worsening of the sickness of the community. Unrest, fear and anxiety are increasing as a result of improper and incomplete, education. Education can yield peace and prosperity only when, along with technical skills and objective information, students are equipped with moral ideals, righteous living, and spiritual insight.

(Each one desires to loll on sofas in airconditioned office rooms. Can this be named pleasure? Can this be the ideal for an educated person? This state will only breed physical and mental illness. How can a student be regarded as a success, if at the end of the course, he knocks at the door of every office, exhibiting the diploma he has secured, and clamouring like a beggar asking for jobs? Education has conferred on student this disgraceful role).

The educated person must serve the people through sweat and toil. Education has to inspire youth to offer service, to sacrifice and to help. Education without right conduct is of no value. You must make use of what you have learnt, not only for earning a living but for service to society. Whatever job you may take up, wherever you may be working, you must continue to practise spiritual discipline and aim at Self-realisation. Without a spiritual basis, education is futile.

Whatever learning one may acquire, whatever positions one may occupy, however great a scientist one may be, if one lacks human values, one is no human being at all.

Of what avail are speeches and exhibitions if these values are not practised? The world will not be reformed by propaganda. It is only when there are living examples of these ideals that they become meaningful and inspiring.

How can Grace enter when you do not seek It? Open the door of endeavour; the Merciful Lord will then come in, with the Crown of Success.