Chapter 11 - Complete Happiness
Day 57
Each one is responsible for raising his own level of consciousness. Each person is responsible for either becoming happier or sadder. To the extent that one is centered and firmly established in the self, that much he will find happiness in positive situations.
You yourselves have to uplift your consciousness. What do you say? "I leave it up to God. If he wishes, if it is necessary, he will call me." But you do not say this when you go shopping for clothes or for jewelry.
For the work that you enjoy doing, you invest your full efforts and work day and night. But if you are called to do some charitable work or sadhana, you say, "If God wants, it will happen."
You put in your full effort when it comes to worldly matters, attaining righteousness, money and desire. And if it does not suit you, then you will not bother about righteousness either.
If there is a desire to do something, then you will spend all your money. For example, to celebrate a wedding people spend all the money they have.
But if someone invites you to come meditate for five days, or even for three days, you say, "How can I apply for three davs leave? And what will we do with this wasted leave time?
If God wishes me to meditate later, maybe after retirement, he will ensure that meditation happens as I am sitting. You want everything to happen in keeping with our comfort.
What do you do for sadhana and to reach enlightenment? You leave it to fate, saying that I will go to satsang if destiny moves me to. Maya comes to you through fate, which fixes how much amount of praise, success or money you receive.
It is through effort that happiness and pleasure in life increase, but you leave your happiness up to fate, and engage your efforts to gain maya.
Are you getting this? You need to change your perception. What is the quality of your life? What level of consciousness have you attained? Who is responsible for this and who creates your life?
You create it. Who is responsible for so much dullness in your life? You are the cause. From morning to evening you eat snacks and fried foods, masala dosa and
bisi bele bhat, and lots of it too.
Then you say, "If God wills, I will meditate." How can meditation happen? During the day, you will fall asleep. You stuff yourself with varieties of fried, oily foods and then complain that your mind is not steady.
How could it be steady? Keep an eye on your food. If you eat food that is light, it creates a lighter mind. We alone are responsible for our mind, intellect, memory and body.
People eat whatever they want and then come, asking, "Gurudev please cure my disease" There should be a limit to your food intake. You have been advised to take less oil or fewer fried foods, still you ignore this advice and eat spicy food.
The stomach says enough, but the tongue wants more. You do not set a limit for your stomach and tongue. That is disease. When there is no disease, then you do not feel like doing exercise or yoga.
You say, "No, I do not want to do all these. It is up to my fate. Whatever God wants will happen, and I will live out the natural life span allotted to me. Who wants to take the trouble to do so many stretches?
If I fall sick, I can take a pill. It's
easier than bending the body and doing sun salutations. Nowadays, there are ready made ways to lose weight." You invest all our efforts in these artificial methods.
What do you do to raise the level of your consciousness, which is naturally available? This needs your attention. You have to see that. Consciousness has created this creation out of itself with different qualities.
There is only one consciousness, but it has given different amounts of intelligence to an ant, a cockroach or a fly, as is
required by each creature. It is not easy to catch a fly.
Even monkeys have the right amount of intelligence that they need. Similarly, humans have been given the amount of intelligence they require.
Animals use all their intelligence, however much they have, but humans have not used it to its full capacity. Although they have more intelligence, they have not properly utilised it.
We are misers not only with money, but also with our brain. Once there was a brain exhibition, "Brains for Sale," because many people come to this world without brains.
There is the possibility that either God forgot to give them a brain or that someone was rushed and did not take enough. Anyway, a big exhibition of brains took place, with various brains on display.
There were brains of great scientists like Vishweshwaraya with tags showing their price. One brain belonged to Manku Timma, a fool in a Kannada novel.
A visitor at the exhibition saw its price tag and was shocked : "There seems to be some mistake. The tags must have been switched. This tag should go with his brain."
The organiser said, "No, no, everything is in proper order.
He used his brain very well, and so now it has no value, while Timma did not use his brain at all, so it is very valuable." Most people are misers with their brains and return them without ever having used them.
