Once, A young Disciple was doing Sevaa in the Ashram. He was cutting Vegetables. While cutting vegetables, a thought arised in his mind that he wanted to go to a nearby temple and offer his prayers to The Lord. After some time, He went to The Master and asked His permission to go to the temple for offering his prayers.
Other Disciples were eager to know, what The Master will say. Will he permit or not?
The Master asked him, "Is the temple visit your Sankalpa (intention) or just a passing thought?"
The Disciple said, "No. I decided last night to go with few Ashram Visitors, who were planning to go to the temple. That is all."
The Master said, "So, You have already made the sankalpa yesterday. Sankalpa will keep us focussed on it, till it is not fulfilled. So, first of all, go and Fulfil the sankalpa and come. You can continue with your Ashram Sevaa after coming back."
The Disciple's mind was fully immersed in planning his temple visit. The Disciple alongwith other visitors went to the temple and started offering his prayer to The Lord.
As soon as he started the prayer, His Simran of The Naama given by The Master at the time of Initiation automatically started to come. As he tried to focus his attention on The Lord, his Dhyaan got transfixed on The Master. In place of The Lord's deity, He was having The Darshan of His Master.
He immediately rushed back to the Ashram shared his experience with The Master. The Master understood the Disciple's confusion and said, "Before getting initiated, we can take up our own Sankalpa. But after taking the Initiation from The Master, A Disciple's True Prayer is The Naama and Naama Bhakti. If a Disciple wants to take any Sankalpa, it should always be to do Simran and Dhyaan. That is it.
That is the reason, as soon as you started your prayer, it assumed its true form, The Naama form. Naama Bhakti is The Lord's most favoured prayer from His devotees.
Secondly, A Disciple should always seek the permission of The Master before taking any Sankalpa. Because The Master is fully aware of not only the needs and necessities of the Disciple. The Master knows what is good or bad for him. But if a Disciple makes a Sankalpa and goes to The Master, then The Master will never stop, as the Disciple has established an identity of His own separate from The Master, by taking Sankalpa."
All the Disciples in the Ashram learnt a valuable lesson. Our Sevaa is to do Simran and Dhyaan. As and when, we make Spiritual progress, then our Sevaa will be to do Antar Simran and Antar Dhyaan of The True Master, The Naama.
One day, The Master and The Disciples were doing Meditation in the Ashram. One of the disciple's mind was wavering and wandering persistently. The Disciple could not control His mind from the worldly thoughts. The Disciple thought, "Let me give up on meditation and open my eyes, may be after seeing The Master's face, I may be able to meditate.'
As the Disciple opened his eyes to see The Master, The Master too opened His eyes and said, "You abandoned the Meditation thinking it is the habit of the mind to wander. That is not correct. Whatever we practise, will become our habit. If we practice to control our mind persistently then mind under control will become our habit. We will be able to continue with our meditation.
Whatever said, We should not open our eyes during Meditation because our Mind is always ready to wander, if given opportunity. Once we open the eyes, though it will surely have the physical Darshan of The Master, it will give an opportunity to peek into the world. It just needs an opportunity, it could be To see how many are doing Meditation and how many have opened their eyes.
Dhyaan can not be transfixed through external sources. It is only through Simran, we can control our Mind. The Simran will also automatically lead our Dhyaan towards The Master. So, even if our mind is wandering, we should keep doing Simran, keep repeating The Naama. Slowly, The Naama will prevail and the mind will be in control of The Naama and then it will start to relish doing Naama Bhakti."
The Master is always helping us to walk on the right path. Our absolute Faith in The Master and Acceptance of His words as The Authority, will ensure, we Live in The Master's Will. Once We start doing Naama Bhakti regularly and Live in The Remembrance of The Lord, by The Master's Grace we will make Spiritual progress. Let us do Simran, The Master is waiting for us. Let us connect and enjoy The Company of The Master. Naama Bhakti is the only way to reach The Master and The Lord.
Authored by K. Giri
