Chapter 6 - Guru Is The Way
Day 39
The mind is just like a mantra. We can realise this if we examine the mind and the intellect. When a thought arises in the mind, it is not easy to get rid of it.
The thought keeps coming back over and over again, and if you decide to do something else, you will feel uneasy until you finish with that thought.
It becomes irritating like a grain of sand in the eye. Observe the state of the mind in this situation. If someone gives you ten compliments and one insult, what does the mind hold onto?
It clings to the one insult. It comes to the mind again and again throughout the morning, afternoon, evening and night. Similarly, if you are unhappy about something, that sadness does not easily leave you, whatever you do to get rid of it.
Even by listening to inspiring discourses that sadness does not go away. Everything is full of happiness, but where is it? The mind discards good things and clings to misery.
Many times you tell your mind that something is trivial and not to worry about it. What happens after you tell your mind this?
The mind or intellect does not pay any attention. So what do we do? We chant a mantra. What is the use of chanting a mantra?
Our mind takes the form of the mantra that we repeat. A person's face and nature become like the one that he worships or thinks about over and over again.
That is why we say, "Look at his face." Since we cannot see the mind, we look at the face. Many times, the face reflects the mind.
If you look at the face of a person who is always scheming, you immediately know his intentions and you become alert. Similarly, look at the eyes of someone who is greedy - they look at others as though they will gobble them up.
Greed streams through their eyes. Miserliness can also be seen easily, and anger can be seen in the face of an angry person. For them, becoming angry is a habit, like a mantra.
If you get angry again and again in the morning and evening, anger becomes a mantra for you. Look at a person who worries - you can see it in the dullness written in bold all over his face.
He sits there as if the world had fallen on his head. They give off such vibrations. If you keep worrying, you will have worries following one after another.
Mullah Nasruddin always complained, from morning till night. If coffee was served, he would say, "My wife has given me too much coffee."
If coffee was not served, he would complain that it had not been served. Sometimes he complained, "There is too much sugar in the coffee," and at other times, "There is not enough sugar."
In a year when there was plenty of rain, and the crop was good, some people thought that there would be nothing to complain about.
Then Mullah said, "Everything was fine, but because of too much crop there is more workload. I am not used to so much work, and now I have to harvest this.
He never stopped complaining. The mind of a person who habitually complains has made complaining his mantra. In order to be happy and pleasant, we have to practice being full of joy.
You may have observed that some children, despite falling and getting cut, are happy and smiling. Other children cry even before falling because they are afraid of falling.
One can cry after falling, but to start crying before anything happens is not normal. The feelings in our mind keep repeating themselves.
Often, people who worry too much feel compelled to visit astrologers and temples. If you look at the faces of the people who visit temples, they are all worries and anxiety.
They think they will feel relief after receiving blessings at the temple, but in reality, they are not sure. To keep the mind happy, one has to form a habit.
How to be happy? One way is by chanting a mantra. It means a mantra is that which is brought to mind again and again. How to practice this?
The mind and the mantra should not be separate. The mind should become the mantra. For this, you can use any mantra. What happens to us?
We want to follow a mantra, but the mind goes elsewhere. We chant, "om namah shivaya, om namah shivaya," but inside we wonder whether or not our son has left the house or what is cooking.
All such thoughts occur while people chant mantras. If the mind thinks of something else while chanting the mantra, the mantra will not be effective.
The mind should be filled with the mantra. The moment that happens, the mind is free from worry. What is worry? A worry is something that is not in place.
It is neither here nor there. A mantra is necessary to drive out worries. What is there in a mantra? A mantra has strength and spirit. When these are present, the mind becomes the power of the mantra.
The power of the mind and the power of a mantra are the same. For example, when we sing bhajans or chant "Shiva, Shiva," the mantra becomes powerful.
Thus the mind becomes filled with consciousness. When consciousness, increases, we come back to the sutra.
