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ON SPIRITUALITY
Where
is God? GOD you do not find? No
God – not at all? But why should He be found? And to own Him, what right have you? How much of yourself have you offered to
Him? Every moment, every limb of yours, how far have you consecrated? Your call is merely lip-deep. You have called on Him in a slight difficulty or out of sheer curiosity, and forthwith is He to appear before you in person? Perhaps He does come down. But where is your
eye to see? Seated in an abysmal, pitch-dark cave,
tightly closing your eyes in addition, you cry out in a fit of restive passion
and with a stupendous laugh of disdain "Where is the Sun, where is the
lamp of Phoebus? No Sun, none." No question of freedom for one who is subdued and trampled under the feet of others. If one really wants to have a glimpse of freedom, it is not possible through mere ire, spite, disbelief, despair or at easy ease. Fitness for freedom has to be acquired. The essential requisite is yoga, arduous yoga. Fear
not – the first step towards freedom is the consciousness of and revolt
against subjection. If the ordinary life of the world is felt as the domain of
a Non-God – if there be a God He cannot remain inside the wheel of this
creation – if there be a Lord of this world-machine, then He must be a satanic
god, a crippled god – this is the first realisation. Whenever you say, "Where is God? Where is He? Nowhere,"
that shows the commencement of your soul's awakening,
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however insignificant it may be. For you feel
a sense of want and dissatisfaction in everything including God. Your
denial of God is the first step towards God-realisation. One who finds
fulfilment in the ordinary life and is content with and enamoured of it, one
who needs nothing over and above life, is no better than a tree, a stone, an
animal, a gorilla or a chimpanzee. Sulking,
spite, denial, disrespect, constitute the first step. The second step is a calm
expectation, a persistent faith, one-pointed love and devotion and a complete
reliance. Who has bound me with fetters? Have I
immersed myself in the infernal region of my own fancy? At
the very outset you yourself agreed and gave your consent to enter into this
region and then perhaps you were overpowered by all others conjointly. You wanted to exercise your freedom at your sweet will. The
ultimate result thereof has been your slavery. The
human soul has this freedom because it is a portion of God, who is but the
absolute Freedom. If He wants, He can drag Himself down to bondage. Likewise,
He has the capacity to free Himself from and rise above bondage. Man
has the capacity to unravel the ravelled skein of life of which he himself is
the cause. And that is the aim of his life's discipline. However,
that knot was not woven in a day. Through aeons, owing to the pressure of the
consequences of man's actions, it has become solidified and hard; it appears to
be unbreakable and adamant. It is quite natural that a great period of time
should be necessary to untie the knot. But
as a matter of fact it is not so. Here the Grace of God intervenes. Within this
creation, in this domain oblivious of God, there is a power of Compassion that
comes into close contact with the soul which is open and really wakeful. With
the firm consent of the soul, Compassion liberates it from its entanglements
and bondages of millennia. If not quicker than at once, it brings about
liberation before long.
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you can take a step forward toward God with your own effort, you will find that
He has already advanced a hundred steps toward you. God
accepts you with all your dirt and filth on account of which alone you fail to
realise that He has accepted you. He has been leading you slowly and steadily
through these murky elements. When
the receptacle becomes hallowed and serene, then alone will the Being and the
Will of God be reflected therein. At that very moment
they will dawn on you and you will possess something of His Knowledge, Power
and Bliss. Man
is at bottom a portion of God and of God alone. Toward God Himself is his
irresistible march.
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