Words from the Master

Your mind has become a dead pattern that is constantly repeating ‘what next’.

When you are able to look at things with a wonder-filled attitude, with awe, it fills you with such gratitude and fulfillment because you are not questioning at that point in time. You are not allowing your mind to play at all. You are simply resonating with your heart. It is then that you become a child, and when you become a child, nothing is mundane, everything is wondrous!

That is why children are so beautiful to look at. Their mind is not dead; their mind is fresh and flowing. Society has not yet conditioned their minds with the familiar patterns.

Learn to look at everything with gratitude and awe. Take your own body for example. Just try this small exercise now: Sit down and close your eyes. Just visualize that your little finger on the right hand is cut in a minor accident. Imagine now that your little finger is only three fourths of its original size. There is no other deformity in your body that you know of. You have a perfect body. Suddenly, only your little finger is cut.

How will your reaction be? It will be very difficult for you to digest it. For every simple task that you use your hand for, the little finger has a role to play, is it not? What will happen to you? You might even become depressed.

Now just think, how many people are there in this world with so many deformities. There are so many people who don’t have all five fingers even! From your head to your toe, even if there were a single handicap, you will miss enjoying some aspect of life, am I right?

Just try to spend a few minutes everyday in your room by yourself, touching every part of your body with love, and thanking that part for enabling you to enjoy so many things in Life.

Have you ever thought about your body in this fashion? How much you take your body for granted? How much you abuse your body? Some of us even hate our bodies because we feel it is not beautiful enough. I tell you, if you do this exercise everyday and feel deep love and gratitude to every part of your body, you will see that your whole body and face glow with a new radiance altogether.

Your body responds to your mind. Never neglect it or take it for granted. After all, it is only with your body that you are able to enjoy so many things. Even for you to come here today and listen to this talk effortlessly, you need all the parts of your body to function properly. Is it not?

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

Imagine if you had to sit down and make a list of things that you feel you have been showered with in Life. You can start the list with your own eyes. As I said earlier, do you know how many people have not been blessed with eyesight? Can you even imagine what will happen if you woke up one day and realized that you have turned blind? You will not even be able to get out of your bed and go to the bathroom! Every task you performed thanklessly earlier will demand all your effort for it now.

Anyway, if you start writing a list of things that you have been given in life, it will be a long list. Once you finish this list, write down a list of the things that you feel you have not been given. This will also be a long list... a very long list actually! The list will probably start with a benz car and end up being longer than the benz car itself! Both the lists are endless, infinite actually, if you write sincerely without missing a single thing.

Alright, now we have the two lists in front of us. It is now up to us to decide which of the lists we are going to see. Are we are going to look at the things not given to us and make our lives dull and dead, or look at the things that have been showered on us and enjoy, making our lives beautiful. It is purely our choice!

A person who takes everything for granted will look at the second list with greed and discontentment. When you are greedy, you will automatically feel only discontented, because there is no end to your greed and therefore contentment can never happen in you! Anyhow, this person totally misses out on the joy of Life that is there in the first list!

Anything that comes his way, whether it is small or big, will seem ordinary to him and he will only wait for the next thing to arrive. And when the next thing arrives, that will also look ordinary to him because he is already thinking of the next thing!

Whereas, a person who is always in gratitude, will not even know that the second list exists! He only knows to feel and breathe gratitude every moment. Life is an eternal celebration for him. He will be so light and joyful. He will be a treat to watch. He will exude a beauty that is unique unto himself. He does not even know that there is a second list. He does not know that language at all! He knows only to enjoy everything with deep love and gratitude, that’s all.

Just by being in gratitude all the time, every so-called mundane thing in life can become sacred and wonderful! I tell you: You think that life has become mundane only because of your attitude of taking things for granted. Life is not mundane as you think. Every small thing is so beautiful. Your mind is what is mundane; your mind does not allow you to penetrate and see the beautiful way in which Existence is flowing.

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

One more small story:

One man came home from work one day to find his wife in a terrible mood.
She screamed to him, “I finally managed to train up the maid to do all the work in the house and she has now quit!”
The man asked sympathetically, “For what reason, dear?”
She replied, “Well, you are the reason! She claims that you spoke so rudely to her over the telephone that she felt she needed to guard her self-respect and therefore quit.”
The man was baffled and blurted, “But I thought I was talking to you!”

(Laughter!)

We always take relationships for granted and get into complications because of that. Learn to treat every individual as a part of the Whole and feel gratitude towards him or her; then you will never take anyone for granted. You will then worship and respect everyone for being a part of Existence.

When you don’t take things for granted, you will count your blessings. If you sit and analyse, you will realize that we always count what we have not received! However much we are showered, we are not happy because we are thinking about the things that have not yet reached us!

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

Discontentment will pull you down, make you heavy and miserable. On the other hand, gratitude and the fulfillment that comes along with it, will make you light and blissful. We all feel discontented because we take things for granted. When you take things for granted, you miss a lot and nothing will make you happy or joyful. I tell you: Never take anything for granted.

Listen to this small story:

A beggar stopped a man on the road and asked him, “Two years back, you used to give me 20 rupees; last year fully, you gave me only 10 rupees; for the past few months, you are giving me only 2 rupees, why?”
The man replied, “First I was a bachelor, then I married and now I have a baby, that’s why.”
The beggar cried, “What? You are using my money to run your family?”

(Loud laughter!)

The beggar says, “You are using my money to run your family!” Actually, many of us think that it is our birthright to expect another person to keep providing for us and for our needs. And we simply take them for granted.

We don’t realise what deep ignorance we are in when we have this kind of attitude. We are not even aware that we are totally lacking, when we are this way. This whole attitude has to undergo a radical change. Even your own father or mother or husband or wife should not be taken for granted.

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

Let me explain what I mean by tuning. We all know how the radio works, don’t we?

Yes Swamiji…

Alright, the same radio, without any change in its physical form, can be connected to many radio stations airing different programs, is it not? While you are listening to a particular station, if there are any disturbances or cross-talk, what do you do? Tell me.

We fine-tune it Swamiji.

Exactly! To listen more clearly to any one station, you need to fine-tune it, that’s all. Now, just apply this same concept to tuning ourselves to Existence.
There are thousands of programs happening around us. Whatever we tune ourselves to, that we will experience. Now, tuning to any one program is purely our own choice; any one objecting to this? No. You have the freedom to choose the program you wish to listen to, am I right?

(The audience murmur) Yes Swamiji…

In the same way, if you choose to tune yourself with the chaos that is created around you by human minds, you will become chaotic. You will be caught in the never-ending whirlpool of worry, discontentment, dilemma and what not.

Whereas, when you choose to tune yourself with Existence, with the central chord that is running this whole show, you have caught the right thread in all the chaos that is around you and will be free from all these emotions. You will become a beautiful flower that blossoms with a fragrance.

With the earlier emotions, life will seem like an eternal state of discontentment. With the latter, life will become music - the very language of Existence, and you will only enjoy with gratitude all the time. The more you fine-tune yourself with Existence, the more ecstatic life will be.

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

With your head, you will always seek outside and you can never find God outside. With your head, you will be looking for reasons to feel grateful. When you move from your head to your heart, a whole new space will open out for you, and you will realize that you always knew, and that it was your mind which was causing all the havoc and not letting you realize it.

When you operate from your heart, you are always in gratitude. Do we ever say ‘mind-felt gratitude’? No! We always say ‘heart-felt gratitude’, is it not?

Next, you will ask, “How do we move from our head to our heart Swamiji!” Just be aware of your head, that is enough! Only because you are unaware of your head, you allow it to function in an undisturbed fashion, in a mechanical fashion. Once you become aware of your head, you will be able to drop it.

Gratitude is not any virtue. It has to be your very attitude. You need nothing more than this to feel yourself tuning in with Existence. When you feel only gratitude, you can tune yourself beautifully to Existence, and then Existence will reveal to you its magical splendour. All you need to do then is sit back and enjoy!

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

These few days you are going to be here, use them effectively to experience what I am saying. Allow gratitude to take root in these seven days, when you are away from the outer world. Open up and allow yourself to flower. This is a rare opportunity for you. This is a chance for you to transform. Don’t miss it. Create that new inner space in you, which will go with you when you leave this place.

You see: The problem is, we are always trying to reach God through our heads. You can never reach God through your head. If you simply drop your head, you will automatically function through your heart and discover that you need not even reach out to Him; He is already there in you!

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

A small story:

A teacher once asked her students, “Can anyone tell me where you think hell is?”
After a long silence, one girl stood up and replied, “In my Dad’s study, Miss.”
The teacher was surprised and asked her why she said that.
The child replied, “Every time I go to my Dad’s study, he says: Get the hell out of here!”

(Laughter!)

Children are trained from a young age, to think of hell and heaven as entities outside of them. They are trained to think that God is sitting above, on a big throne, and watching every movement of ours, and noting down our sins and good deeds.

By thinking in this way, we start the cause and effect cycle of all our actions. We associate good deeds with heaven and bad deeds with hell. We start thinking of God and the whole of Existence as a transaction center. Each one of us becomes a businessman in our own way, whatever may be our real profession!

What do you do when you go to the temple? You purchase flowers, coconuts and fruits, and go to the Deity inside and make an offering in your family’s name to the deity. You tell the name, birthstar etc. of each and every member of your family and do the ritual.

The poor priest will hold one bowl in his hand and you will be telling him a long list of names with all the details of each of your family members. You are so afraid that God will send the blessings to the wrong person, to the wrong household! You give him the exact geographical location etc. and emphasize to him that it is you and no one else who has come with the offering. Only after doing this, you leave the temple. Am I right?

As if God does not know you if you don’t tell him all this! As if you need to remind God of your existence so that he will shower on you. I tell you: All you need to do is, feel continued gratitude towards Him, that’s all. He is always showering on you.

It is not that he sees you in trouble and then decides to bail you out, or sees that you are alright and therefore ignores you. All these are our own conditionings that we project on God and try to read. All these are what society has taught us from a young age.

The concept of gratitude has become so distorted among us. We feel that gratitude is something we have to feel when we are brought out of deep trouble or when someone goes out of his way in caring or sharing. This is the most ridiculous belief taught to us.

I tell you: Simply enter into the temple with a feeling of gratitude; stand before every deity for a few minutes with deep thankfulness, and leave the temple with that same mood. That is enough. The rest will be taken care of. This is the ultimate prayer. Gratitude is the ultimate pooja or offering.

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

Your profession may be anything, your social status may be anything, your economic status may be anything, but enjoying is something that every man can do irrespective of all this.

The problem is: You always feel that there should be a causative factor for everything including enjoyment. You have trained your mind with these kinds of thought patterns. This is also the reason why, you often feel, that others have been blessed with things that they don’t deserve, while you have not been given enough for your efforts.

You always think that you need to work hard in order to enjoy. No! Working hard is alright, but it has nothing to do with the capacity to enjoy. Drop this idea. This is the only way you can stop complaining or feeling dissatisfied.

Existence showers. If you choose to enjoy it, you will. It is purely your choice. You choose wrongly and then complain or blame someone else. Remember, no one is responsible for anything that happens to you. Everything is a conscious choice that you make unconsciously. Because of lack of awareness in you, you simply make unconscious and monotonous decisions and land up complaining about Life.

Always remember: Heaven and hell are not geographical locations in the outside world. You create them within yourself. The moment you lose trust over Existence, you alienate yourself from it and carry hell with you wherever you go. Don’t think that hell is something outside of you. It is just in your mind. It is your choice, your nature that decides if you are in hell or heaven.

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

A small story:

There was a man who was walking past a mango grove, which was overflowing with mangoes of different varieties.
He entered the grove, looked around, studied it, took down some statistics and left half an hour later, with facts and figures.
After a while, another man walked past the same grove.
He entered it, plucked a few mangoes, ate them joyfully and left!

(Muffled laughter!)

Now, please don’t stop by at any mango grove and eat up the mangoes. You might get stoned for it! Try to understand what I am trying to tell. Just learn to enjoy without questioning. I don’t mean that you should drop all your work and only enjoy all the time.

You need to work no doubt. No one is going to give you everything if you only enjoy. I am only saying, don’t look for reasons to enjoy, that’s all. Simply enjoy everything without questioning. Let enjoying become your very nature, then gratitude will become your very Being.

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

Try out this small exercise when you are by yourself:

For two hours, keep aside your worries and needs, and focus on all that Existence has already given you. You will immediately think, If I don’t worry about my needs, how can I fulfill them? Who will take care of my family? What will happen to my business? Agreed, you have to think about all these things. But just for the next two hours, take all these loads off your head and do what I am saying.

In any case, do you think your family or your business is running because of you? Let me tell you, things are running smoothly not because of us, but in spite of us! If Existence had to depend on our intelligence to sustain our families or our wealth, we would all be destitute by now! And be very clear: By simply worrying, nothing can be achieved. I think we have spoken enough about worrying earlier!

So just for a few minutes, close your eyes and focus on what has already been showered on you, what you already have. Go over mentally all the things – your body, your wealth, the people who support and help you, your house, your luxuries, your vacations, everything. Enjoy all of them in a relaxed and grateful way. Take as much time as possible.

Don’t rush and go over it in a hurry. Just live all of it in your mind. Stay with that feeling. Stay with that wonderful feeling of fulfillment for a while. Feel yourself becoming filled with gratitude and overflowing with it. When you open your eyes, you will see that what you have is more than enough to run your life! And you will wonder - what more you want!

You have to just become gratitude! The best way to become gratitude is, to learn to enjoy without a reason. Enjoy everything that you see, everything that you hear, and everything that you do, with the supreme confidence that Existence is taking care. Life will then simply transform in your eyes and you will be overflowing all the time because you are always enjoying.

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

A small story:

A man dreamt that he went to Heaven and that an Angel was showing him around Heaven.
They walked side-by-side.
First, they entered a large workroom filled with many Angels.
The room was bustling with activity.
The Angel guide stopped and explained to the man, “This is the Receiving Section. Here, all petitions to God that are received through prayer are sorted out.”
The man looked around and saw that it was terribly busy with so many Angels sorting out petitions written on different pieces of paper - long sheets, scrap sheets and what not. They were from people all over the world, in different languages.
Then they moved on and entered a second section.
This section was also filled with many busy Angels and lots of packages and papers.
The guide Angel explained, “This is the Packaging and Delivery Section. Here, the graces and blessings that the people asked for, are processed and delivered to them on Earth below.”
They walked on and at the end of the long corridor they stopped at the door of a small room.
To the man’s surprise, only one Angel was seated there, bent over the desk.
The man asked the Angel, “How come this section is so quiet? Which section is this?”
The Angel friend quietly replied, “This is the Blessings Acknowledgment Section. The acknowledgements sent by the people for the blessings that they have received, are meant to be processed here.”

We all ask and ask, but how many of us thank for what we have received? How many of us include gratitude in our prayer along with our asking?

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

A small story:

One man dreamt that he and God were walking on the beach through the journey of life.
He told God, “Oh Lord! I dreamt that you and I were walking on the sands of the beach. When I looked back at the trails on the sand, I saw that at times when life was most testing, at times when I had the deepest troubles, there was only one line of footsteps, the other was missing. How could you move away from me during those times?”
God replied, “Son! It was during those times that I carried you!”

Let me tell you from my own experience: In my days of wandering, I have traveled more than 30,000 km out of which, more than 2000 km I have covered by foot. I traveled with just two pieces of clothing and a vessel for begging food. I took a vow not to touch money, and not to save food for the next meal.

People ask me how it was possible. I tell you now: I simply placed trust on Existence and concentrated on my goal that was attaining the state of Enlightenment, and Existence took care of me; that is how it happened.

When you hear me saying things like have faith in Existence, you may think that this concept is for yester-years of Justice and Saints. Not at all. I am talking from my own experience, from what has happened to me who is sitting right in front of you now! And I think I am the youngest in this gathering! So I am not talking of anything from long ago. Understand that.

Just try living with gratitude and watch the miracles happening. Existence gives, if you are ready to receive without a question, with just a brimming heart.

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

When you are loving, flowing, filled with gratitude, you will always feel the tremendous energy of Existence flowing through you and you will always be with a sense of fulfillment, not because of any gains but because it has become your very Being! This fulfillment is the ultimate fulfillment that every man is seeking, although he is not aware of it. He searches for it again and again in all material things and keeps missing it.

Whether you accept it or not, Existence is taking care of you and all you need to do is, place your faith in it and do your duty with gratitude. You will then be showered upon by Existence.

But we don’t have faith.

A small story:

One man lived without any faith in God.
Suddenly one day, he fell from a hilltop and found himself dangling from just the grip of a tree’s root.
He was filled with terror.
He suddenly remembered people talking about God all the time.
He thought to himself, ‘why not try to ask God for help’ and he cried out, “Oh God! I have never had faith in you; are you really there? Can you save me now?”
The voice of God thundered back, “Sure son, just let go of the root that you are holding and I will hold you from beneath.”
The man cried out again, “Is there anyone else out there who can help me!”

(Laughter!)

We are simply not ready to place our trust on Existence! The very quality of trusting the Universe in your Being will make you live like God on Earth! You are missing out on this wonderful opportunity due to your own ignorance and ego.

If we consciously feel a sense of continued gratitude towards the Cosmic Energy, we will be able to feel ourselves being taken care of in its very lap. We will feel ourselves being cradled by this Energy, like a child is by the Mother and whether you accept it or not, this is the Truth.

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

Once a man went to Ramana Maharshi and said, “Bhagwan, I want peace!”
Ramana replied, “From your own statement, just remove the word ‘I’, remove the word ‘want’ – and what remains is Peace!”

The only way to have a live connection with reality, with Existence, is by dropping your conditionings, your ego and breaking the wall you have built around yourself; then you will be able to see that the connection was always there! You don’t have to do anything special, you simply have to drop what is not, that’s all!

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

Things are always perfect when you function with gratitude. Else, things are always lacking and ugly. Man’s greed is such that even if he is made king of the earth, he will think: The seas don’t obey me; the sun and stars don’t obey my commands!

In the Shiva Purana, there is the story of Shiva and the Brahma Kapaala.

The Brahma Kapaala was a skull that Shiva used as a begging bowl, when he was wandering in the guise of a mendicant.

The strange thing about the Brahma Kapaala was that, whatever alms people put into it, it would promptly swallow!

No matter how hard Shiva tried to fill it, the bowl always remained empty.

This Brahma Kapaala is actually inside all of us. It is nothing but our own ego; the ego that swallows everything and asks for more! The ego that prevents us from enjoying what is being showered upon us.

Whether you want to base your life on asking, or on gratitude, it is entirely up to you. Gratitude is not some kind of morality that can be imposed on you from outside. It is an attitude that has to flower from within, out of a deep understanding of Existence and its ways. When real gratitude happens, it can transform your whole perception of life and bring lasting peace and joy for you.

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

See understand: Desire and gratitude can never co-exist. When you feel one desire after another, it means that you are not living with gratitude. When you live with gratitude, you can never have any desires. When you live with gratitude, whatever is given to you will simply fulfill whatever you need at that moment, that’s all. Even before you ask, you will be given, so there will be no question of asking!

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

Another small story about Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa:

It is said, that whenever Ramakrishna saw someone from Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s place, he would fall at his or her feet.

Chaitanya Mahaprabhu was a great Enlightened Master from India.

On one such occasion, when Ramakrishna fell at someone’s feet, the people around him asked him why he fell at ordinary mortals’ feet.

He replied, “Whether they are ordinary or extraordinary, it does not matter. They are from Baanigaati – where Chaitanya did an important sankeertan. The moment I hear that they are from there, the very name creates memories of Chaitanya in me, that is enough. I pay my gratitude to them by falling at their feet for having brought Chaitanya to my mind. If I had not met them, in those moments, I might have been thinking of something else unworthy. They are therefore instruments through whom divine memories and ideas are kindled in me.”

That was Ramakrishna’s reply!

For bringing thoughts about Chaitanya to him, Ramakrishna fell at their feet! Can we imagine this today? This is what I mean when I say, everything and everyone should be looked upon with gratitude for whatever they are doing. They are all part of Existence and they are all moving in some synchronicity, orchestrated by Existence. When you are sensitive to this happening, you will be able to feel gratitude for the way things are happening.

We need to imbibe this sense of gratitude from great Masters. This is the only thing we need to imbibe from them, the rest will be taken care of automatically, because when you imbibe this, the power of coincidence will make things happen for you and Existence will simply shower upon you.

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

We always live with a ‘what next’ attitude. We are unable to relate to gratitude because of this.

For example, if we go to a shop and see a new type of alarm clock with some new features, immediately, we feel that our life will be much better with those new features. We will feel that the whole quality of our life will change if those new features become available to us. We will feel that we will become a lot more efficient with this clock in our lives. So we buy it and take it home.

After a few days, what happens? We won’t even have the time to wipe the precious clock! The poor clock will be lying somewhere covered with dust and you will even get scolded for buying it and cluttering the house with one more item! And you would have also moved to some other gadget, some other desire!

We always feel that something that we don’t have is as big as a mountain without which we cannot survive, but when we actually get it, somehow it becomes too small a thing. This is how we miss the wonderful attitude of gratitude in our lives. We keep running behind ‘what next’.

Bhagwan Ramana Maharshi tells God: “I am so very intelligent. I gave you all that I had, all my life - full of suffering. You in your compassion gave me in return your presence of Bliss!”

Bhagwan tells God that he is more intelligent than God Himself because of this intelligent exchange! Such is his adorable sense of gratitude towards Existence! It simply hits you when you read it.

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

A small story:

One man was traveling on the highway to get to his village.
After just one hour of travel, his car jerked and stopped.
He was panic-stricken and saw that he had run out of fuel.
He walked a few kilometers praying and sweating and panting and finally came to a town.
He spotted a gas station and explained that he was penniless, but badly needed fuel to get to his village. They turned him away.
He then spotted another station on the opposite side of the road and walked into it and explained his situation.
The manager of the bunk took pity on him and agreed to fill in a few liters free of cost.
The man asked, “Can you give me the money instead? The station across the road is cheaper.”

Until something comes to us, it seems very precious and we remain in a prayerful mood; the moment it comes, it loses its value and we move on… to another prayer!

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

A small story:

One day, the Geography teacher in a school asked her students to write down the Seven Wonders of the World.
All the kids listed the great wonders like the Great Wall of China, the Pyramids, the Eiffel Tower and so on.
One girl was writing and she kept writing, shaking her head and continuing to write.
The teacher came to her and asked, “What happened, you forgot what you learnt?”
The little girl said, “No. I am a bit confused. There are many more than seven.”
The teacher was surprised and took her sheet and read it. She then read it aloud for the class to hear, “The seven wonders of the world are: I can see; I can touch; I can smell; I can hear; I can taste; I can laugh; I can love…”
The class was suddenly filled with penetrating silence.

These small things are forgotten because we think that they are small. Everything becomes small to us when it is easily available. There are so many millions of people in this world who can’t see, who can’t hear, who can’t talk, who can’t taste. We never think of all these things. We are always thinking of what more, what better, what next, all the time, that’s all.

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

A small story:

A man prayed very hard in a temple one day, “Oh Lord! Please give me 1000 rupees for 15 days. I am very desperate to receive it. I will return the money to you on the 16th day from today when I get my first paycheck.”
The temple priest was listening to his prayers.
He felt very sorry to see him in that state.
He had with him 500 rupees. He put it in a cover and gave it to the man saying that God had asked him to give him the money.
The man was overjoyed. He took the cover home and opened it.
He counted the money and saw that there was only 500 rupees and not 1000 rupees.
The next day he went to the temple and prayed to God, “O God! next time, please don’t send the money through the priest; send it directly. He took half of it.”

(Loud laughter!)

We take everything for granted and therefore remain discontented!

Remember: Life itself is a gift to you! Have you worked hard to get it? Can any of you say that you have worked very hard to earn this life? No! That is why we don’t realize its value! We simply take everything for granted – our bodies, our daily food, the beauty of nature – everything is taken for granted. We ask God for diamond rings – but do we thank him for giving us fingers to wear them? With time, even the diamond ring will lose its value to us!

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

A small story:

One man was on a cross-country rail.
He spent all his time in the observation car, watching the passing scenery outside.
An elderly lady was seated next to him and he told her that the best part of the journey was the breathtaking scenery outside.
The lady shook her head, sat for a while looking out of the window, and left.
A little later, the lady came back, sat for a short while looking out of the window, and then got up and went.
After some time she came again and this time she sat behind him.
After a few minutes went by, she tapped him on the back and asked, “Excuse me, but do you see something that I don’t?”

(Laughter!)

We all simply miss the beauty of Existence when we don’t know how to resonate with it! We are all the time looking for reasons to enjoy, reasons to celebrate, questioning what we enjoy, and what not! We have lost our connection with Existence altogether because of this.

Instead of feeling gratitude towards everything around us, we are asking and questioning all the time. We need to get back this connection with Existence again. Gratitude can help bring back this lost connection. It can help you find your roots once again. It can help you commune with nature, with Existence.

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

When you drop the mundane logic of your mind, you will flow like a river – choicelessly, effortlessly, joyfully with the flow of the current. You will then play your role and enjoy every moment of it. You will then understand that you are a part of a wonderful drama, where in the more sensitive you are to the conductor, the more effectively you can play and enjoy your part!

When you go against the current, you need to put in effort and exercise choices. When you go with the current, you don’t need to make any effort; you will not feel tired; you will not feel frustrated; you will only feel a flowing lightness and joy! Everything will then appear beautiful to you.

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

A small story:

A Sufi Master, Junnaid used to pay his gratitude to God five times a day.
At one time, he and his followers were wandering through some villages where Sufism was not accepted as a religion.
In the first village, people accused them of begging, and threw meager alms at them.
The next day, the people refused to give them any alms.
On the third day, the village they passed through was so hostile that the villagers drove them out with sticks and stones.
That night as usual, Junnaid knelt down and offered his gratitude to God.
His disciples were watching him. It was too much for them. They could not understand why Junnaid was thanking God. They were furious.
They cried out, “Master! For three days we have gone without food! Today we were even driven out of that village like dogs! Is this what you are offering your gratitude for?”
Junnaid looked at them and said, “You talk about three days of hunger! Have you thanked God for the food you have received for thirty years? And know one thing: My gratitude is not for receiving or not receiving anything. It is simply an expression of the deep joy and love in my Being; it is a choice-less and prayerful expression, that’s all.”

When you live with overwhelming gratitude in you, you have found a space wherein nothing else is needed. It means that you have fallen into meditation. Then, you will not worry about anything else. You are on the right track. Your mind is no longer a hindrance to your growth. Your mind has disappeared. The mind cannot step in because you are brimming from your heart. There is no space for your mind. When there is no space for your mind, where will discontentment come from? Discontentment cannot come from the heart. It is purely a product of the mind.

Your mind always stands between you and Existence. It prevents you from hearing, seeing, feeling and emoting with Existence. Once you go beyond your mind and see the beauty of Existence, gratitude will become your prayer and bliss your Being! You will then enjoy liberation and permanent joy!

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

Most of us pray with fear to God. You can see mothers telling their children that if they don’t do certain things, God will get angry with them. These statements take root in the child at a very young age, and give them a wrong concept of God. All these are the conditionings that you give to your child at an early age. When they grow up, they face serious dilemmas because of this. Instead of embracing Existence with love and gratitude, they stand apart from it with respect and fear.

Religion if followed out of fear will not take you anywhere; it will not pave the way for a transformation to happen in you. You might progress materially by the faith that you have in your asking, but you will remain where you are at the Being level. The purpose or real fulfillment of life can never happen in the material path; it can happen only at the Being level. People who undergo what is called depression of success will be able to relate to what I am saying, in a better way. We have discussed a lot about depression of success in the earlier sessions.

Religion has to be followed out of deep love and gratitude for the Divine or Existence. Although society teaches you to worship God in the name of fear, I tell you: Never do it. Always pray with love and gratitude towards the Divine.

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

You might think: giving your gratitude can be a social habit, how can it be a meditation? But you will understand what I mean when you actually start giving your gratitude. When you start giving your gratitude, you will understand the value of your life.

I tell you: You are only aware of the people who are directly responsible for providing and caring for you. But during all these times and thousands of other times that you are not even aware of, you are helped, protected, and cared for by Existence, by the Cosmos, by the Universal Energy.

But you always think that whatever was given to you, was either because you deserved it or because it was an accident. When you start seeing and feeling the invisible hand of Existence taking care of you, you will understand that you are wanted here by Existence. Only then you will understand that you are being showered upon continuously by Existence.

The fact that you are alive is enough to show that Existence wants you here and cares for you. It is only when you don’t understand this, you feel dull and depressed and keep asking as if you are the most deprived person in the world.
If you listen from your Being to what is being said here, you will be able to tune yourself and become sensitive to the wonderful giving ways of Existence!

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

One day a poor man went to Emperor Akbar’s palace.
He wanted to request Akbar to give him some money for his son’s studies.
Akbar was known for not turning away anyone who asked for help.
When the man reached the palace, he saw that Akbar was offering his prayers to God. So he waited with the others outside the prayer hall.
When Akbar came out, everybody made their requests and received help from him.
Only the poor man turned away, without asking for anything.
But Akbar spotted him and called him back.
He asked him, “Why are you leaving without asking for anything?”
The man replied, “Your Majesty, I came to ask you for alms, but saw that you yourself were begging!”

If you observe our prayers, you will realize that all of us are actually beggars. We simply ask, ask and ask. Our prayer is nothing but a begging bowl. We beg for material things, for smooth relationships, for power, for achieving our goals, for physical beauty, and what not.

We are all the time asking for something or the other continuously in our minds. In fact we are so much in tune with asking, that it has become an unconscious process within ourselves and we might not even accept that we are asking. We might argue that we are not asking, because we don’t see it as asking. We see it as a natural way of life! We have become so involved in it and therefore unable to distance ourselves from it and see it with a fresh mind.

Understand: There are only two kinds of religion in the world; religions based on prayer, and religions based on gratitude.

The religion of prayer is all about asking God for something or the other. It can be followed by the masses, because it is very much in tune with our asking attitude. It is in tune with the conditioning that has gone inside us from a young age. Asking is the prayer that we have been taught from when we were children. It seems like the most natural way to approach God or Existence.

On the other hand, the religion of gratitude, is based on just an overwhelming gratitude from within, towards God or Existence. It is quite contrary to what is taught to us from childhood. We have always been taught to thank only for what has been received, that’s all. We have been taught gratitude as social etiquette, nothing more than that!

How then can we be thankful all the time? It becomes too much! That is why, these religions of gratitude are followed by a select few.

Only a few meditative religions, like Buddhism or Sufism, are based on gratitude. These religions have very few followers, but the quality of the followers is high.

You see: There is nothing wrong with prayer, but getting stuck in the act of asking while praying, is where the trouble starts. Prayer should be used as a jumping board to enter into meditation, a meditation where gratitude becomes prayer and your Being becomes bliss!

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Words from the Master

We will now go into the last chakra - the Sahasrara chakra which is located on the crown of the head.

In Sanskrit, Sahasrara means ‘thousand petalled’ - from the mystical experience of a thousand-petalled lotus blooming on the crown, when this chakra is activated.

This chakra is closed by discontentment and the attitude of taking life for granted and it can be made to flower by overflowing gratitude and contentment!
(Meditation Technique: Sahasrara Dhyana - a Sufi meditation technique.)

A small story:

A man prays to God every day, “O God, I don’t have enough money. Please help me win a big lottery worth at least ten million rupees! If I win, I promise you, I will offer 20 percent of my winnings at your shrine. If you don’t believe me, please deduct 2 million for yourself, and give me only the remaining 8 million.”
(Uproarious laughter from the group!)

All our dealings are exactly like this – a mere business! It may not be so obvious in our lives, but if you deeply analyze your attitude of prayer, you will understand that you are all the time having a business deal with everyone, including God.

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This excerpt has been taken from the book: Guaranteed Solutions.

Purpose of life is to live enlightenment

EVERY moment, the choices you have in life from Existence are actually infinite. Existence is like the mother who waits expectantly, longingly for her little child just learning to take the first steps in this world. She is waiting for you to learn to live life in the best way — live enlightenment. She is waiting eagerly for you to open her gift of life. She wants to see that joy and surprise on your face when you discover your gift and enjoy it — by living enlightenment.

God designed this world with only one purpose — to make you experience His love. All He wants to see is a smile on your face, a blissful overflowing in your being, as you enjoy these wonderful gifts He has made just for you. There is no other purpose to life. It is a straight and simple universe inviting you to play with it, flirt with it, and experience the joy of pure romance with it.

You are not an accident; you are an incident. You are a conscious miracle of Existence. Life is not a forced happening you have to go through. Life is a living vibrant partner, playing an exciting game, a mysterious adventure that opens out new vistas in front of you every second.

Understand, whenever you think life is throwing surprises at you, life wants to understand you. It is curious to know about you, just like a naughty little kid constantly playing with you and teasing you. It just says, ‘If I talk like this, what will you do? If I do this, what will you do?’ What you call difficult situations or people are just the naughty yet innocent pranks of the little child — sometimes running into your arms, sometimes pinching your cheek and running away, sometimes angry because you did not appreciate its innocent act.

Life is your partner. It is asking you, ‘If I present myself like this in front of you, what will you do?’ Just enjoy this pure romance, delicate as a rose yet strong. This is not the dead strength of a rock, it is the vibrant strength of life — it can express in infinite dimensions this moment yet the very next moment it may not even be alive. Life is just like that — intensely alive and bubbling, unaffected by what can happen the very next moment.

Every moment is a gift from the Divine — the only way to pay your gratitude for the gift is to be intensely alive in this moment, to live enlightenment. The expression of living enlightenment is experiencing complete fulfilment. You are just overflowing within yourself, so you don’t need anything more. This is the natural state in which every single human being is designed to live.

Jealousy has no solid existence

JEALOUSY has no solid existence. Jealousy is like darkness. Darkness does not have an independent, positive existence. Darkness is not the presence of something. Darkness is just the absence of light. In the same way, jealousy has no independent, solid existence by itself and is just the absence of knowledge or awareness.

Emotions such as fear, desire and guilt are subjective emotions. You do not require another person or even an object to create these emotions. Imagine that you are in a soundproof room with your eyes closed and with nothing to touch, taste or smell. You can still experience the emotions of fear or desire. But to compare yourself with another person and to feel jealous of him, you need the presence of another person.

Jealousy needs an object to be activated. There is no end to comparison because comparison exists in the mind, not in reality. Hence, jealousy that arises from comparison indeed has no basis. Jealousy is closely related to many negative emotions — anger, greed, possessiveness, depression, etc. All of these emotions will dissolve when we break this cycle of jealousy.

Suppose there was a huge ladder and everybody in the world was asked to stand on it in ascending order of success in any field, such as beauty, intelligence, etc. You would probably position yourself somewhere in the middle of the ladder. There are many people above you but there are also many people below you. Observing the people above you causes you to feel jealous; so you constantly try to become better than them in order to move further up the ladder. Now, at some point in your life, you may realise the uselessness of this never-ending game. Then you want to jump off the ladder. This is where the fight starts. When you look up, you experience misery, but when you look down, you experience happiness. So even though you now begin to realise the futility of spending your life just climbing the ladder, still you are not able to jump off the ladder because if you jump off, you will be left alone — there will be nobody above you or below you.

This does not mean that the best way out of the problem of comparison and jealousy is to avoid looking at others and their achievements. You can’t escape from your mind just by ignoring your thoughts! If you can look but not be affected by what you see, then you have found the right way. If you can accept and welcome what you see and what happens, then you are centred within yourself and nothing can shake you.

Be Blissful!