About This Book

Man’s Eternal Quest is the first in a series of anthologies of Paramahansa

Yogananda’s collected talks. Published in 1975, it was followed by The

Divine Romance and Journey to Self-realization. Included in these

anthologies are lectures, informal classes, and inspirational writings,

originally published by Self-Realization Fellowship in the magazine

founded by Sri Yogananda in 1925 (known since 1948 as Self-Realization).

Most of the talks were given at the Self-Realization Fellowship temples he

established and at the international headquarters of his society in Los

Angeles. He spoke extemporaneously, using no notes or written text,

regardless of his topic. That his words have been preserved for present and

future generations is due primarily to the devoted efforts of one of his

earliest and closest disciples, who served for many years as his confidential

secretary and assisted him in carrying out his spiritual and humanitarian

work. For more than two decades Sri Daya Mata (president of Self-

Realization Fellowship from 1955 until her passing in 2010) recorded

stenographically his public lectures and classes, the guidance he gave

informally when meeting with small groups of disciples, and much of his

personal counsel. Man’s Eternal Quest provides readers with a generous

selection of Paramahansa Yogananda’s written and spoken words on a wide

range of subjects—and offers as well a glimpse of the dynamic and loving

personality of the great world teacher.

All rights in this digital edition of Man’s Eternal Quest are reserved by Self-

Realization Fellowship.

Note to the Reader

Subject only to any conditions established by the distributor from which

you obtained this book, Self-Realization Fellowship welcomes you to

download this edition onto any number of your own devices for your

individual, non-commercial use; and to print excerpts for your own

reference.

Kindly note, however, that upon acquiring this edition the reader agrees to

abide by applicable national and international copyright laws; and to abstain

from distributing, reproducing, or transmitting the contents to other

individuals or entities, by any means (electronic, mechanical, or otherwise)

without the publisher’s prior written consent. We appreciate your

cooperation in respecting the author’s work and in helping to preserve its

integrity by upholding these principles.

Thank you for supporting our non-profit publishing endeavors in

connection with the legacy of Paramahansa Yogananda.

Authorized by the International Publications Council of

SELF-REALIZATION FELLOWSHIP

3880 San Rafael Avenue

Los Angeles, California 90065-3219

The Self-Realization Fellowship name and emblem (shown above) appear

on all SRF books, recordings, and other publications, as an assurance that a

work originates with the society established by Paramahansa Yogananda

and faithfully conveys his teachings.

Second edition. Ebook edition, 2017.

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 75-17183

ISBN: 978-0-87612-233-4 (hardcover)

ISBN: 978-0-87612-232-7 (paperback)

ISBN: 978-0-87612-777-3 (Kindle edition)

ISBN: 978-0-87612-778-0 (ePub edition)

Dedicated by Self-Realization Fellowship

to our beloved president,

SRI DAYA MATA

whose faithful devotion to recording the

words of her guru for posterity has

preserved for us and for the ages the

liberating wisdom and God-love

of Paramahansa Yogananda

The Spiritual Legacy of Paramahansa Yogananda

His Complete Writings, Lectures, and Informal Talks

Paramahansa Yogananda founded Self-Realization Fellowship in 1920 to

disseminate his teachings worldwide and to preserve their purity and

integrity for generations to come. A prolific writer and lecturer from his

earliest years in America, he created a renowned and voluminous body of

works on the yoga science of meditation, the art of balanced living, and the

underlying unity of all great religions. Today this unique and far-reaching

spiritual legacy lives on, inspiring millions of truth-seekers all over the

world.

In accord with the express wishes of the great master, Self-Realization

Fellowship has continued the ongoing task of publishing and keeping

permanently in print The Complete Works of Paramahansa Yogananda.

These include not only the final editions of all the books he published

during his lifetime, but also many new titles—works that had remained

unpublished at the time of his passing in 1952, or which had been serialized

over the years in incomplete form in Self-Realization Fellowship’s

magazine, as well as hundreds of profoundly inspiring lectures and informal

talks recorded but not printed before his passing.

Paramahansa Yogananda personally chose and trained those close disciples

who have headed the Self-Realization Fellowship Publications Council

since his passing, and gave them specific guidelines for the preparation and

publishing of his teachings. The members of the SRF Publications Council

(monks and nuns who have taken lifelong vows of renunciation and selfless

service) honor these guidelines as a sacred trust, in order that the universal

message of this beloved world teacher will live on in its original power and

authenticity.

The Self-Realization Fellowship emblem (shown above) was designated by

Paramahansa Yogananda to identify the nonprofit society he founded as the

authorized source of his teachings. The SRF name and emblem appear on

all Self-Realization Fellowship publications and recordings, assuring the

reader that a work originates with the organization founded by Paramahansa

Yogananda and conveys his teachings as he himself intended they be given.

—Self-Realization Fellowship

Contents

Preface

Introduction

How Seekers First Found God

Three Aspects of Nature

A Story About Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva

God, the Supreme Cause

Evidence of Order and Harmony Is Everywhere

Devotion and Right Activity Attract God’s Attention

Meditation Is the Highest Form of Activity

The Self Is Your Savior

Reason Gives Man the Power to Seek God

The Two Paths: Activity and Meditation

Skyfuls of Eternal Bliss Will Be Opened

The Universality of Yoga

The Blind Cannot Lead the Blind

Yoga Converts Theology to Practical Experience

The Soul Must Reascend to God

Secret of Happiness Is Consciousness of God’s Presence

Meditation Makes the Yogi

The Infinite Nature of God

We Have Descended From the Infinite Into the Finite

God’s True Nature Known Only Through Intuition

Satan Created Ignorance, Cause of All Suffering

Meditation Lifts the Fog of Ignorance

Give God First Place in Your Heart

Awake From the Nightmare of Suffering

In Oneness With God Know That Life Is a Dream

Answered Prayers

Prayer Is a Demand of the Soul

In Will Power Lies the Germ of Success

Cauterize the “Can’ts” in Your Brain

Seek the Company of Those Who Strengthen Your Faith

Assure Your Ultimate Arrival in Heaven

Surcharge Your Will Power Through Concentration

Who Will Persist Until God Answers?

Your Greatest Necessity Is God

Follow the Rules of Prayer

Making Religion Scientific

God Is Waiting for Your Invitation

Creation Is Meant to Disillusion You

Seek a Definite Understanding of Truth

By Yoga, Religion Can Be Made Scientific

Satan Makes Us Think God Is Unattainable

Meditation Is the True Practice of Religion

Meditation Provides the Proof of God’s Existence

Intensity, Secrecy, Devotion, and Constancy Are Necessary

Understanding the Unreality of Matter

The Chemical Elements of Matter Are Electronic Vibrations

The Universe Is God’s Dream

Man’s Greatest Adventure

The Origin and Power of Memory

Creation—Dual Adventure of God and Man

Prenatal Consciousness

The Breath of Life

Man Should Befriend Himself

The Subtle Enemies

Prepare for Every Kind of Battle

The Importance of Mind Power

The Ultimate Protection Is God-Communion

The Goal of Our Life-Adventure

Self-Analysis: Key to the Mastery of Life

Without Self-Analysis, Man Leads Robotlike Life

Traits From Past Lives Influence Us Now

Whatever You Have Done, You Can Undo

Thought Produces Everything in the Universe

Dreams Reveal the Omnipotence of Mind

Change Your Mental Attitude

The Conditions of Happiness: Plain Living, High Thinking

Seclusion Is the Price of Greatness

Healing by God’s Unlimited Power

Balanced Development Is Essential

Obey Nature’s Laws and Have More Faith in God

Fruits, Vegetables, and Nuts Superior to Meat

Purify the Body of Harmful Toxins

Increase Your Natural Resistance to Disease

You Can Increase Your Life Span

The Power of a Smile

Permanent Healing Comes From God

Eliminating the Static of Fear From the Mind Radio

The World Is Only a Thought in the Mind of God

Fear Cannot Enter a Quiet Heart

Be Cautious But Not Fearful

Techniques of Tuning Out Fear

Fear Ceases With the Contact of God

A Single Thought May Lead to Redemption

Nervousness—Cause and Cure

Far-Reaching Effects of Nervousness

The Nervous System

Overcome Nervousness by Good Company

Calmness Is the Best Cure

The Physical and Spiritual Rewards of Fasting

Self-Control—the Sanest Way to Health and Happiness

Know the Right Way to Fast

Function Well Under All Circumstances

The Metaphysical Science Behind Fasting

Self-realization: Criterion of Religion

Spiritual Development Must Balance Material Advancement

My Only Wish Is to Give You a Glimpse of God

It Is Necessary to Understand the Meaning of Religion

True Religion Satisfies the Demands of Your Soul

Whatever Religion You Choose, Give It a Good Test

Realizing God Requires Self-Disciplinary Effort

All Churches Should Be Hives of God-Communion

Scientific Methods Needed to Follow the First Commandment

Self-realization Converts Conviction Into Experience

Practice Truth—Meditate—for God-Communion

The Desire That Satisfies All Desires

God’s Children Should Not Beg

The Danger of Unfulfilled Desires

Love Thine Enemies

Conscience Will Tell You What You Are

Man’s Lost Treasure Is God

Take God, Not Life, Seriously

Environment Shapes Our Desires

Be Safe in the Castle of God’s Presence

Carry a Portable Heaven Within

In God Is All Happiness

God Must Come to Those Who Truly Want Him

Seek God in Solitude

Look to God Alone

How to Be More Likable

Attractiveness Comes From Within

You Are Judged Largely by the Way You Conduct Yourself

When With Others, Be Sincere and Thoughtful

Live for Others and They Will Live for You

Perfect Balance Is the Altar of God

Seek God, and Be Victorious in Life

Developing Personality

Intuition Develops One’s True Personality

Man Can Be Whatever He Wants to Be

Never Forget Your True Nature!

Awaken Your Divine Personality

The Divine Art of Making Friends

Develop Friendships From the Past

To Attract Friends, Improve Your Character

Give Friendship to All, As God Does

Universal Friendship Starts at Home

The True Experience of Spiritual Ecstasy

The Wine of Spiritual Ecstasy Is Incomparable

Consciousness Has a Limitless Span

What Is the Proof of Self-realization?

Beyond the Kaleidoscope of Subconsciousness

Three Paths to Cosmic Consciousness

Concentration—A Requisite for Finding God

The Invisible Source of Visible Worlds

The First Path to Cosmic Consciousness

The Second Path

The Third and Highest Path

Be a Smile Millionaire

Beyond Peace Is Bliss

Smile With the Love of God

To Find Bliss, Meditate

How to Banish External Impressions

The Motion Picture of Creation

Don’t Question God—Love Him

Lord, Possess Us With Thy Love

God Is the Lover Behind All Love

Don’t Waste Time

Call God Your Own

Controlling Your New Year’s Destiny

Reclaim Your Lost Divinity

Apply Will and Discrimination to Resolution

Are You a Psychological Antique?

A Stream of Divine Power

The Best Resolution—Give More Time to God

How to Outwit Temptation

Why Sense Experiences Are Alluring

Habit Is a Pitiless Dictator

Wisdom Is Man’s Best Protection

Even If You Are the Greatest Sinner, Forget It

Fix Your Mind in the Divine Consciousness of Meditation

Curing Mental Alcoholics

A False Conception

Counteractive Influences

Petty Dictators

Overcoming Malignant Moods

We Live in a Glass House

Moods Get Their Grip on a Vacant Mind

Moods Are the Brakes on Your Wheels of Progress

Magical Effect of Sincere Love

Live in a World of Wonder

Fear Enters When God Is Shut Out of Life

Reincarnation Can Be Scientifically Proven

Scientific Law

How Were the Spiritual Laws Discovered?

Relaxation in Sleep

Current Withdrawn

An Amazing Case

Follow the Practices

Reincarnation: The Soul’s Journey to Perfection

The Importance of Time

How We Live This Life Determines What We Are in the Next

Analyze Yourself to See How You Should Change

Discern Between Inner Worth and Outer Position

Exchange of Souls Between East and West

Past Associations Influence Present Affinities

A Pure Heart—A Clear Insight

We Must Perfect Love in at Least One Relationship

Will Jesus Reincarnate Again?

Divine Justice and the Law of Reincarnation

Jesus Was Eliseus in His Former Life

Christ Comes in Vision and in the Flesh to His Devotees

All Great Avatars Will Come Again

The Dream Nature of the World

Matter Originates in Thought

Pride Is the Greatest Barrier to Wisdom

Dissociate Yourself From Your Experiences

Concentrate First on God

God’s Nature in the Mother and the Father

PART ONE: THE MOTHER

PART TWO: THE FATHER

Example Is the Best Teacher

Looking at Creation With Seeing Eyes

The Limitations of the Physical Senses

The Infinite Potential of Thought

In God-Consciousness Everything Becomes Beautiful

This World Is a Temporal Place

Seek the Lord Who Is Hiding Behind Creation

The Invisible Man

Investigate the Electricity That Lights the Body Bulb

Man’s Body Is Composed of 35 Thoughts of God

The Invisible Man Is Free From Suffering and Death

Everything Is the Result of an Idea

Realize Your Immortality Now

What Are Ghosts?

The Triune Nature of Man

At Death We Are Still Encased in the Astral and Causal Bodies

The Intelligence in Prana Creates the Physical Body

Death Should Not Be Feared

It Is Possible to Enter and Leave the Body Consciously

The Power of Black Magic Is in Your Thought

The Cosmic War of Good and Evil

The Temptation of Adam and Eve

Listen Only to the Voice of God

Jesus: A Christ of East and West

The True Nature of the Star of the East

Train Your Heart to Feel the Brotherhood of Man

God Does Not Like to Be Forgotten

A Vision of Christ at the Yogoda School in India

Truth Is a Universal Experience

Christ and Krishna: Avatars of the One Truth

The Universal Consciousness

Concepts of God and Trinity Agree

The Pitfalls of Body Consciousness

Significance of Krishna’s Life for Modern Man

Moral Doctrines Universal in the Scriptures

Reincarnation in the Gita and the Bible

Christ Born an Oriental to Unite East and West

A Vision of Christ and Krishna

The Ten Commandments: Eternal Rules of Happiness

The Ten Eternal Rules of Happiness

How to Read Character

Physical Appearance an Index of Character

Emotions as a Clue to Character

Evenmindedness, a Key to Development

Animal Characteristics in Man

Intuition Is the Surest Judge of Character

How to Be Happy at Will

Basis of Reactions

Negative and Positive Peace

Drink Deep of Bliss

Steps Toward the Universal Christ Consciousness

Psychological Expansion of Consciousness

Conscious, Subconscious, and Superconscious Memory

Sympathy a Key to Christ Consciousness

Metaphysical Way to Christ Consciousness

The “Sons of God”

Evenmindedness in a World of Change

Pain Is Perceived Only in the Mind

You Can Free Yourself From the Sensory Dictators

Habits Begin to Form at Age Three

Man’s Life Is Totally Independent of the Body

The Right Way to Look at Death

Exude Peace and Goodness

Good and Evil Are Created in the Mind

When the Soul Commands, the Mind Obeys

The Balanced Life (Curing Mental Abnormalities)

Spiritual Melancholia

Spiritual Indigestion

Sowing Mental “Wild Oats”

Mental Cold

Mental Catarrh

Psychological Fixation

Religious Fixation

Spiritual Principles Should Be Taught

“How-to-Live” Schools Are Needed

Increasing the Power of Initiative

Don’t Be a One-Horsepower Person

You Must Discover the Power You Have

The Lord’s Infinite Power Sustains You

God Meant the World for Our Entertainment

Who Made God?

Varying Perspectives

Spirit Is Free From Causation

The Missing Link Between Consciousness and Matter

Difference Between Illusion and Delusion

The Cosmic Magician’s Grand Illusion

How Consciousness Became Matter

Wrong Thoughts Obstruct God’s Perfect Thought-Pictures

Will, the Cosmic Energizer

Is God a Father or a Mother?

God Is Both Father and Mother

Pure Reason and Pure Feeling Are Intuitive

A Vision of Divine Mother

A Test of Faith

The Art of Developing Memory

Develop Divine Memory

Effect of Physical Exercise on Memory

Foods That Increase Memory Power

Practice Exercising Memory

Meditation Strengthens Memory

Remember Good Experiences

Man’s Eternal Quest

What Is a Successful Life?

Happiness Is a Creation of Our Own Mind

To Be Happy Under All Circumstances Is Real Success

Evolutionary Human Progress Lies in the Power of Thought

Receive Knowledge Directly From Spirit

Man’s Evolution Ordained by Cosmic Law

God Fulfills Man’s Eternal Quest

Nature Veils God’s Presence

How to Discover Spirit

Yoga Is the Science of Finding God

Your Prayer Must Be Intense to Reach God

Practice of Yoga Awakens Soul Longing

This World Is Only Pictures of Light

God Is Our Only True Goal

The Art of Living

Practical Methods for Uniform Development

Be Calmly Active and Actively Calm

Habit—Your Master or Your Slave?

Are Habit Slaves Born or Made?

Impeach a Bad Habit-President and Install a Good One

It Takes Time to Establish Habits, Good or Bad

Creating and Destroying Habits at Will

Why Let Your Habits Dictate to You?

Be Guided by Wisdom, Not Convention

True Freedom Versus Whim Freedom

Fight Bad Habits With “Won’t” Power

Habits Are Mental Phonograph Records

Maintain Your Freedom as a Child of God

Developing Dynamic Will

Wisdom and Will Govern Body and Mind

Physiological Will—First Expression of Will Power

Without Wisdom, Will Becomes Habit-Bound

Stages of Will Development

The World Will Try to Trick You

In Your Will Power Lies the Image of God

Nothing Is Impossible When Will Becomes Dynamic

Seek God Now!

Perseverance Is the Whole Magic of Spiritual Success

Keep a Daily Appointment With God

Kriya Yoga—Highest Method of God-Contact

To Find God, Be Loyal to God

Why Waste Time? God Is the Joy You Seek

“My Words Shall Not Pass Away”

Life Is a Caravan

Good Company Is of Supreme Importance

Never Forget God

March on Toward the Lord’s Kingdom

Please Man by Pleasing God

Seek the Recognition of God

God as Light and Joy

The Way to True Freedom

With God-Realization Comes All Power

God Speaks Only Through His Devotees

God Is the Only Guru

I Cried and Prayed, Day and Night

Pray Only to Know God

Have I Found God?

The Purpose of Life Is to Find God

To Ignore God Is Not Common Sense

The Romance of Divine Love

God! God! God! (poem)

Glossary

Illustrations
Cover: Paramahansa Yogananda at Mysore Palace, India, 1935
Paramahansa Yogananda (Frontispiece)
Paramahansa Yogananda in New York, 1926
Sri Yogananda’s yoga classes in three cities
Paramahansa Yogananda, 1926
Mahatma Gandhi and Sri Yogananda
Dedication of SRF Lake Shrine and Gandhi Memorial
Paramahansa Yogananda in the early 1920s
Yoga class in New York City, 1926
Paramahansa Yogananda at the White House, Washington, D.C.
Sri Yogananda welcoming Ambassador of India, 1952
SRF International Headquarters, Los Angeles

Preface

(By Sri Daya Mata (1914 – 2010), third president and spiritual head of Self-

Realization Fellowship/Yogoda Satsanga Society of India)

The first time I beheld Paramahansa Yogananda, he was speaking before a

vast, enraptured audience in Salt Lake City. The year was 1931. As I stood

at the back of the crowded auditorium, I became transfixed, unaware of

anything around me except the speaker and his words. My whole being was

absorbed in the wisdom and divine love that were pouring into my soul and

flooding my heart and mind. I could only think, “This man loves God as I

have always longed to love Him. He knows God. Him I shall follow.” And

from that moment, I did.

As I felt the transfiguring power of his words on my own life during those

early days with Paramahansaji, there arose within me a feeling of the urgent

need to preserve his words for all the world, for all time. It became my

sacred and joyous privilege, during the many years I was with Paramahansa

Yogananda, to record his lectures and classes, and also many informal talks

and words of personal counsel—truly a vast treasure house of wondrous

wisdom and God-love. As Gurudeva spoke, the rush of his inspiration was

often reflected in the swiftness of his speech; he might speak without pause

for minutes at a time, and continue for an hour. While his hearers sat

enthralled, my pen was flying! As I took down his words in shorthand, it

was as though a special grace had descended, instantly translating the

Guru’s voice into the shorthand characters on the page. Their transcription

has been a blessed task that continues to this day. Even after such a long

time—some of my notes are more than forty years old—when I start to

transcribe them, they are miraculously fresh in my mind, as though they had

been recorded yesterday. I can even hear inwardly the inflections of

Gurudeva’s voice in each particular phrase.

The Master seldom made even the slightest preparation for his lectures; if

he prepared anything at all, it might consist of a factual note or two, hastily

jotted down. Very often, while riding in the car on the way to the temple, he

would casually ask one of us: “What is my subject today?” He would put

his mind on it, and then give the lecture extemporaneously from an inner

reservoir of divine inspiration.

The subjects for Gurudeva’s sermons at the temples were set and announced

in advance. But sometimes his mind was working in an entirely different

vein when he began to speak. Regardless of the “subject for today,” the

Master would voice the truths engrossing his consciousness at that moment,

pouring forth priceless wisdom in a steady stream from the abundance of

his own spiritual experience and intuitive perception. Nearly always, at the

close of such a service, a number of people would come forward to thank

him for having enlightened them on a problem that had been troubling

them, or perhaps for having explained some philosophical concept in which

they were particularly interested.

Sometimes, while he was lecturing, the Guru’s consciousness would be so

uplifted that he would momentarily forget the audience and converse

directly with God; his whole being would be overflowing with divine joy

and intoxicating love. In these high states of consciousness, his mind

completely at one with the Divine Consciousness, he inwardly perceived

Truth, and described what he saw. On occasion, God appeared to him as the

Divine Mother, or in some other aspect; or one of our great Gurus, or other

saints, would manifest in vision before him. At such times, even the

audience would feel deeply the special blessing bestowed on all present.

During such a visitation of Saint Francis of Assisi, whom Gurudeva deeply

loved, the Master was inspired to compose the beautiful poem, “God! God!

God!”

The Bhagavad Gita describes an enlightened master in these words: “The

Self shines forth like a sun in those who have banished ignorance by

wisdom” (V:16). One might have been overawed by Paramahansa

Yogananda’s spiritual radiance, were it not for his warmth and naturalness,

and a quiet humility, which put everyone instantly at ease. Each person in

the audience felt that Gurudeva’s talk was addressed to him personally. Not

the least of the Master’s endearing qualities was his understanding sense of

humor. By some choice phrase, gesture, or facial expression he would bring

forth an appreciative response of hearty laughter at just the right moment to

drive home a point, or to relax his listeners after long and intense

concentration on a particularly deep subject.

One cannot convey in the pages of a book the uniqueness and universality

of Paramahansa Yogananda’s vivid, loving personality. But it is my humble

hope, in giving this brief background, to afford a personal glimpse that will

enrich the reader’s enjoyment and appreciation of the talks presented in this

volume.

To have seen my Gurudeva in divine communion; to have heard the

profound truths and devotional outpourings of his soul; to have recorded

them for the ages; and now to share them with all—what joy is mine! May

the Master’s sublime words open wider the doors to unshakable faith in

God, to deeper love for that One who is our beloved Father, Mother, and

Eternal Friend.

Daya Mata

Los Angeles, California

May 1975

Introduction

Mankind is engaged in an eternal quest for that “something else” he hopes

will bring him happiness, complete and unending. For those individual

souls who have sought and found God, the search is over: He is that

Something Else.

—Paramahansa Yogananda

This volume of talks by Paramahansa Yogananda is for all who have ever

known disappointment, dissatisfaction, discouragement, sorrow, or an

unfulfilled spiritual longing. It is for those who have sought to understand

the enigmas of life; for those who have held within their hearts an uncertain

hope about the reality of God and the possibility that He could be known;

and for seekers who have already turned toward God in their quest. May it

be, for each reader, a ray of divine light on the path, bringing new life and

inspiration and a sense of direction. God is all things to all people.

Man’s Eternal Quest is a book about God: about God’s place in man’s life;

in his hopes, will, aspirations, accomplishments. Life, man, achievement—

all are but manifestations of the one omnipresent Creator, as inseparably

dependent on Him as the wave is dependent on the ocean. Paramahansaji

explains why and how man was created by God, and how he is immutably a

part of God, and what this means to each one personally. Realization of the

oneness of man and his Creator is the whole essence of Yoga. An

understanding of man’s inescapable need for God, in every aspect of living,

removes the otherworldliness from religion and makes knowing God the

basis of a scientific and practical approach to life.

As a man of God, and as an authority on the ancient divine science of Yoga,

Paramahansa Yogananda has received the highest credentials from his

spiritual contemporaries, and from readers of his works in all parts of the

world—the literary and general public as well as his followers. That he has

also received the ultimate commendation from the Supreme Authority is

amply attested to by the manifest blessings of God on his exemplary life,

and by the infinitely beautiful, uniquely edifying responses he received

from God in vision and divine communion. This comment in Review of

Religions, published by Columbia University Press, is typical of the

acclaim received by Paramahansa Yogananda’s earlier work,

Autobiography of a Yogi: “There has been nothing before, written in

English or in any other European language, like this presentation of Yoga.”

The San Francisco Chronicle wrote: “Yogananda presents a convincing case

for Yoga, and those who ‘came to scoff’ may remain to pray.” From

Schleswig-Holsteinische Tagespost, Germany: “We must credit this book

with the power to bring about a spiritual revolution.” Of Paramahansa

Yogananda himself, Swami Sivananda, founder of the Divine Life Society,

Rishikesh, India, said: “A rare gem of inestimable value, the like of whom

the world is yet to witness, Paramahansa Yogananda has been an ideal

representative of the ancient sages and seers, the glory of India.” His

Holiness the Shankaracharya of Kanchipuram (1894–1994), revered

spiritual leader of millions in South India, wrote of Paramahansaji: “As a

bright light shining in the midst of darkness, so was Yogananda’s presence

in this world. Such a great soul comes on earth only rarely, when there is a

real need among men. We are grateful to Yogananda for spreading Hindu

philosophy in such a wonderful way in America and the West.”

Paramahansa Yogananda was born in India on January 5, 1893. He had a

remarkable childhood that clearly indicated his life was marked for a divine

destiny. His mother recognized this and encouraged his noble ideals and

spiritual aspirations. When he was only eleven, the loss of his mother,

whom he loved above all else in this world, made firm his inherent resolve

to find God and to receive from the Creator Himself the answers yearned

for in every human heart. He became a disciple of the great Jnanavatar

(incarnation of wisdom) Swami Sri Yukteswar Giri. Sri Yukteswar was one

of a line of exalted gurus, with whom Yoganandaji had been linked from

birth: Sri Yogananda’s parents were disciples of Lahiri Mahasaya, guru of

Sri Yukteswar. When Yogananda was an infant in his mother’s arms, Lahiri

Mahasaya had blessed him and foretold: “Little mother, thy son will be a

yogi. As a spiritual engine, he will carry many souls to God’s kingdom.”

Lahiri Mahasaya was a disciple of Mahavatar Babaji, the deathless master

who revived in this age the ancient science of Kriya Yoga. Praised by

Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita, and by Patanjali in the Yoga Sutras, Kriya

Yoga is both a transcendent technique of meditation and an art of living that

leads to union of the soul with God. Mahavatar Babaji revealed the sacred

Kriya to Lahiri Mahasaya, who handed it down to Sri Yukteswar, who

taught it to Paramahansa Yogananda.

When in 1920 Paramahansa Yogananda was deemed ready to begin his

world mission of disseminating the soul-liberating science of Yoga,

Mahavatar Babaji told him of the divine responsibility that was to be his:

“You are the one I have chosen to spread the message of Kriya Yoga in the

West. Long ago I met your guru Yukteswar at a Kumbha Mela; I told him

then I would send you to him for training. Kriya Yoga, the scientific

technique of God-realization, will ultimately spread in all lands, and aid in

harmonizing the nations through man’s personal, transcendental perception

of the Infinite Father.”

Paramahansa Yogananda began his mission in America as a delegate to the

International Congress of Religious Liberals in Boston in 1920. For more

than a decade he traveled the length and breadth of America, speaking

almost daily to capacity audiences in all the major cities. On January 28,

1925, the Los Angeles Times reported: “The Philharmonic Auditorium

presents the extraordinary spectacle of thousands...being turned away an

hour before the advertised opening of a lecture with the 3000-seat hall filled

to its utmost capacity. Swami Yogananda is the attraction. A Hindu

invading the United States to bring God..., preaching the essence of

Christian doctrine.” It came as no small revelation to the West that Yoga—

so eloquently expounded and clearly interpreted by Sri Yogananda—is a

universal science, and that as such it is indeed the “essence” of all true

religions.

In Los Angeles in 1925, Paramahansa Yogananda founded the international

headquarters for Self-Realization Fellowship, the society he had started in

India in 1917 as Yogoda Satsanga Society of India.

In the late 1930s Paramahansaji began to withdraw gradually from

nationwide public lecturing. “I am not interested in crowds,” he said, “but

in souls who are in earnest to know God.” Thereafter, he concentrated his

efforts on classes for serious students, and spoke mostly at his own Self-

Realization Fellowship temples and the international headquarters. The

selections in this volume are talks given primarily during this period.

Paramahansa Yogananda had often voiced this prediction: “I will not die in

bed, but with my boots on, speaking of God and India.” On March 7, 1952,

the prophecy was fulfilled. At a banquet in honor of the Ambassador of

India, B. R. Sen, Paramahansaji was a guest speaker. He delivered a soul-

stirring address, concluding with these words from a poem he had written,

“My India”: “Where Ganges, woods, Himalayan caves and men dream God

—I am hallowed; my body touched that sod!” He then lifted his eyes

upward and entered mahasamadhi, an advanced yogi’s conscious earth-exit.

He died as he had lived, exhorting man to know God.1

The Guru’s talks in the earliest years of his ministry were recorded only

spasmodically. But when Sri Daya Mata became a disciple of Paramahansa

Yogananda in 1931, she undertook the sacred task, faithfully recording, for

the generations to come, all of her Guru’s talks and classes. This volume is

but a sampling: under the direction of Paramahansa Yogananda, many

transcriptions—particularly those containing private instruction and

meditation techniques and principles given to Self-Realization class

students—were compiled along with some of his writings into a series of

Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons; other talks appear as a regular feature

in Self-Realization magazine. A second anthology, The Divine Romance,

and a third, Journey to Self-realization, are companion volumes to Man’s

Eternal Quest.

As most of the talks set forth in this book were presented before audiences

familiar with Self-Realization teachings, some clarification of terminology

and philosophical concepts may be helpful to the general reader. To this

end, many footnotes have been included; also a glossary explaining certain

Sanskrit words, and other philosophical terms, and giving information about

events, persons, and places associated with the life and work of

Paramahansa Yogananda. It may be noted here that unless otherwise

indicated the quotations from the Bhagavad Gita in this volume are from

Paramahansa Yogananda’s own translations, which he rendered from the

Sanskrit sometimes literally and sometimes in paraphrase, depending on the

context of his talk. For most Gita quotations in this reprinting of Man’s

Eternal Quest, we have used the definitive version given by Paramahansaji

for his comprehensive translation and commentary: God Talks With Arjuna:

The Bhagavad Gita—Royal Science of God-Realization (published by Self-

Realization Fellowship in 1995). In talks where he was rendering a Gita

passage more freely in order to emphasize a specific point, the paraphrase

has been retained and noted as such in the footnote citation.

Paramahansa Yogananda could have said, with Jesus, “Think not that I am

come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to

fulfill” (Matthew 5:17). Paramahansaji honored all religions and their

founders, and held in respect all sincere seekers of God. Part of his world

mission is “to reveal the complete harmony and basic oneness of original

Christianity as taught by Jesus Christ and original Yoga as taught by

Bhagavan Krishna.” (See Aims and Ideals.) Far from introducing a divisive

dogma to the world, Paramahansaji showed that the practice of yoga

establishes an inner attunement with God that constitutes the universal basis

of all religions. Abstractions of theoretical religion pale before actual

experience of God. Truth cannot be wholly proved to any seeker by anyone

else; but by the practice of yoga, the aspirant can prove truth for himself

through his own experience.

God is; and each man who will seek Him sincerely will know Him. Man

can have no life or power to act, think, or feel without borrowing that power

from God. Therefore, Paramahansaji pointed out, knowing God is not only

a privilege and a divine duty, but a practical necessity. Why should man

grovel in self-insufficiency when he can tap the Source of all power and

fulfillment?

The wisdom in this volume is not the studied learning of a scholar; it is the

empirical testimony of a dynamic spiritual personage whose life was filled

with inner joy and outer accomplishment, a world teacher who lived what

he taught, a Premavatar whose sole desire was to share God’s wisdom and

love with all.

Self-Realization Fellowship

Los Angeles, California

1 An award-winning documentary film about Paramahansa Yogananda's life

and work, Awake: The Life of Yogananda, was released in October 2014.

MAN’S ETERNAL QUEST

How Seekers First Found God

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, November 11, 1934

We can readily understand how man first conceived of a science of

medicine. He suffered physically and therefore sought a method to heal

himself. But how did man happen to try to find out about God? The

question gives scope for profound reflection.

In the Vedas1 of India we find the earliest true concept of God. In her

scriptures India has given the world immortal truths that have stood the test

of time.

Every material inventor is actuated by material need—“necessity is the

mother of invention.” Similarly motivated by necessity, the early rishis2 of

India became ardent spiritual seekers. They had found that without inner

satisfaction, no amount of external good fortune can bring lasting

happiness. How then can one make himself really happy? That is the

problem the wise men of India undertook to solve.

Three Aspects of Nature

Worship of God in prehistoric times began through man’s fear of the

various forces of nature. When it rained excessively, floods killed many

people. Awed, man thought of the rain and wind and other natural forces as

gods.

Later on, human beings realized that nature operates in three ways: creative,

preservative, and dissolutive. A wave rising out of the ocean exemplifies

the creative state; staying for a moment on the sea-breast, it is in the

preservative state; and sinking back into the deep, it passes through the

dissolutive state.

Just as Jesus beheld the universal force of evil personified in Satan, so the

great rishis beheld the universal forces of creation, preservation, and

dissolution personified in definite forms. The sages of old named them

Brahma the Creator, Vishnu the Preserver, and Shiva the Destroyer. These

primal powers were created as projections of the unmanifested Spirit to

unfold His infinite drama of creation, while He, as God beyond creation,

remains ever hidden behind their consciousness. In times of cosmic

dissolution, all creation and its vast activating forces dissolve back into

Spirit. There they rest until called upon again by the Great Director to

reenact their roles.3

A Story About Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva

In India there is a popular story about Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva. They

were boasting among themselves about their tremendous might. Suddenly a

little boy came up and said to Brahma, “What do you create?”

“Everything,” Brahma replied grandly. The boy asked the other two gods

what their work was. “We preserve and destroy everything,” they answered.

The young visitor was holding in his hand a single piece of straw about the

size of a toothpick. Placing it in front of Brahma, he asked, “Can you create

a piece of straw like this?” After prodigious effort, Brahma found to his

astonishment that he could not. The lad then turned to Vishnu and asked

him to save the straw, which was slowly starting to dissolve under the boy’s

steady gaze. Vishnu’s efforts to hold it together were fruitless. Finally, the

little stranger produced the piece of straw again and asked Shiva to destroy

it. But try as Shiva would to annihilate it, the tiny straw remained intact.

The little boy turned again to Brahma: “Did you create me?” he asked.

Brahma thought and thought; he could not remember ever having created

this amazing child. Suddenly the boy vanished. The three gods awoke from

their delusion and remembered that behind their power is a Greater Power.

God, the Supreme Cause

In the Western world the idea of God developed through observation of the

law of cause and effect. Man can materialize objects by taking materials

from the earth and shaping them in accordance with a preconceived idea;

therefore it seemed reasonable to conclude that this whole universe must

have been created out of ideas. This led to the concept that everything must

have existed first as an idea. Someone had to create that first idea or cosmic

plan. Thus through the analogy of the law of cause and effect, intelligent

men reasoned that there must be a Supreme Cause.

Science has learned that all matter is made of invisible building blocks—

electrons and protons—just as a house is built of bricks. But nobody can tell

why some electrons and protons become wood, and others become human

bone, and so on. What Intelligence guides them? This line of questioning

gives room for God in even the material scientist’s theories about the nature

of the phenomenal worlds. The sages of India say that everything proceeds

from and goes back into its source: God.

Evidence of Order and Harmony Is Everywhere

Perceiving that every human being is a compound of matter and mind, the

earliest Western thinkers believed that two independent forces existed:

nature and mind. Later they began asking themselves, “Why is everything

in nature arranged in a particular way? Why isn’t one of man’s arms longer

than the other? Why don’t stars and planets collide? Everywhere we see

evidence of order and harmony in the universe.” They concluded that mind

and matter could not be both separate and sovereign; a single Intelligence

must govern all. This conclusion naturally led to the idea that there is just

one God, who is both the Cause and matter and the Intelligence within and

behind it. One who attains the ultimate wisdom realizes that everything is

Spirit—in essence, though hidden in manifestation. If you had the

perception, you would see God in everything. Then the question is, how did

seekers first find Him?

As the beginning step, they closed their eyes to shut out immediate contact

with the world and matter, so they could concentrate more fully on

discovering the Intelligence behind it. They reasoned that they could not

behold God’s presence in nature through the ordinary perceptions of the

five senses. So they began to try to feel Him within themselves by deeper

and deeper concentration. They eventually discovered how to shut off all

five senses, thus temporarily doing away entirely with the consciousness of

matter. The inner world of the Spirit began to open up.4 To those great ones

of ancient India who undeviatingly persisted in these inner investigations,

God finally revealed Himself.

Devotion and Right Activity Attract God’s Attention

Thus the saints gradually began to convert their conceptions of God into

perceptions of Him. That is what you must do also, if you would know

Him. You don’t stay long enough at your prayers. First you must have a

right concept of God—a definite idea through which you can form a

relationship with Him—and then you must meditate5 and pray until that

mental conception becomes changed into actual perception. Then you will

know Him. If you persist, the Lord will come. The Searcher of Hearts wants

only your sincere love. He is like a little child: someone may offer Him his

whole wealth and He doesn’t want it; and another cries to Him, “O Lord, I

love you!” and into that devotee’s heart He comes running.

Don’t seek God with any ulterior motive, but pray to Him with devotion—

unconditional, one-pointed, steady devotion. When your love for Him is as

great as your attachment to your mortal body, He will come to you.

In seeking the Lord, activity comes after devotion in importance. Some say,

“God is Power; therefore let us act with power.” When you are active in

doing good, with the Lord ever uppermost in your mind, you will perceive

Him in this way. But there is wrong as well as right activity even in doing

good. A zealous churchman who brings more and more people into his

congregation solely to satisfy his own ego is not going to please God

through that activity. To realize the presence of the Divine Indweller should

be the first desire in every heart.

It is when you persistently, selflessly perform every action with love-

inspired thoughts of God that He will come to you. Then you realize that

you are the Ocean of Life, which has become the tiny wave of each life.

That is the way of knowing the Lord through activity. When in every action

you think of Him before you act, while you are performing the action, and

after you have finished it, He will reveal Himself to you. You must work,

but let God work through you; this is the best part of devotion. If you are

constantly thinking that He is walking through your feet, working through

your hands, accomplishing through your will, you will know Him. You

should also develop discrimination, so that you prefer spiritually

constructive, God-conscious activity to work performed without any

thought of Him.

Meditation Is the Highest Form of Activity

But greater than activity, devotion, or reason, is meditation. To meditate

truly is to concentrate solely on Spirit. This is esoteric meditation. It is the

highest form of activity that man can perform, and it is the most balanced

way to find God. If you work all the time you may become mechanical and

lose Him in preoccupation with your duties; and if you seek Him only

through discriminative thought you may lose Him in the labyrinths of

endless reasoning; and if you cultivate only devotion for God, your

development may become merely emotional. But meditation combines and

balances all these approaches.

Work, eat, walk, laugh, cry, meditate—only for Him. That is the best way to

live. In so doing you will be truly happy serving Him, loving Him, and

communing with Him. So long as you let the desires and weaknesses of the

physical body control your thoughts and actions, you will not find Him.

Always be master of your body. When you sit in the church or temple, you

perhaps feel a little devotion and a little discriminative perception, but that

is not enough. The esoteric activity of meditation is necessary if you really

want to be aware of His presence.

You might think that after two hours of meditation I would be bored to

death. No, I couldn’t find anything in the world as intoxicating as this God

of mine. When I drink that aged wine of my soul, a skyful of happiness

throbs in my heart. Divine joy is in everyone. Sunlight shines equally on the

charcoal and the diamond, but the diamond reflects the light. Such are the

transparent minds that know and reflect Spirit.

Thus in the esoteric activity of meditation you have the solution to the

mystery of knowing God. I do not blame you for what you do, but for what

you do not do. You think you have no time for God. Suppose the Lord were

too busy to look after you? What then? Wrest your mind from the mirage of

the senses and habit. Why be deluded like that? I am pointing out to you a

land more beautiful than anything here can ever be. I am telling you of a

happiness that will intoxicate you night and day—you won’t need sense

temptations to enthrall you. Discipline your body and your mind. Control

your senses. Find God!

I often say that this body is a switchboard and the five senses are its

telephone instruments. Through them I am in touch with the world; but

when I don’t wish to communicate, I shut off my five senses and live in the

inexpressible joy of God. The Heavenly Father doesn’t want you, His

children, to suffer anymore. The sensory delusion in which you live must be

overcome. You should conceive of God as the highest necessity of life.

Break the shackles of limitation, of dark habits and mechanical daily

routine. I condemn no man—only man’s unbelief and oblivion of God. He

can be known by using the technique of meditation. Then He shall throb as

wisdom in your mind, and as joy in your heart, and you will be more active

and more successful than you have ever been before.

Dear ones, I was once like you. I walked the earth seeking truth and

happiness, yet everything that promised me joy gave me misery, and so I

turned to God. You all must discover your own divinity and win the

kingdom of God for yourselves.

The Self Is Your Savior

These deep truths are not for the inspiration of a passing moment but should

be assimilated and made practical for your highest benefit. If only people

knew wherein lies their own good! To those who act wrongly the Self is an

enemy. Befriend the Self and the Self will save you. There is no other

savior than your Self.6 The fetters of ignorance and bad habits keep you

bound. It is because you are determined to follow your wrong habits that

you suffer. If only you would picture life a little ahead; lest the time, the

precious time that is given you, slip away fruitlessly. The Hindus have a

saying: “The child is busy with play, the youth is busy with sex, and the

adult is busy with worries. How few are busy with God!”

Banish the imaginary hope that happiness will come from worldly

fulfillments. Prosperity isn’t enough, “gracious living” isn’t enough. You

want to be eternally happy. Seize the God within you and realize that the

Self is Divinity. You must be able to answer with surety the highest

question of your intelligence: “Whence did I come?”

God and immortality are not myths. It is the gravest insult to the Self within

you to die believing you are a mortal being. How long will you let

yourselves, sons of God, be helplessly mowed down by the sickle of death

because you never tried during your lifetime to conquer maya,7 ignorance?

Reason Gives Man the Power to Seek God

There is a God. He has given man independence, power, and reason. Man

can find the Lord because of the gift of reason. To spend your time just

playing with life and not finding God is wasting the divinely bestowed

power within you.

Use the key of reason. It is not found in stones and animals. God gave man

reason that he might find freedom from the delusion of mortality. If you let

your reason be trampled by ego and wrong habits, what then? If people bow

to your will, what then? Happiness still eludes you. That is why Jesus chose

God instead of Satan when the Devil tried to tempt him. Jesus realized that

although worldly power has many attractions, it does not last. He had found

something greater than all the riches of this universe. The things that most

men desire are perishable. But God will never leave Jesus. He is still

enjoying the omnipresent divine kingdom. So should each one of us choose

the life that leads to God.

You are punishing the soul by keeping it buried, slumbering in matter life

after life, frightened by nightmares of suffering and death. Realize that you

are the soul! Remember that the Feeling behind your feeling, the Will

behind your will, the Power behind your power, the Wisdom behind your

wisdom is the Infinite Lord. Unite the heart’s feeling and the mind’s reason

in a perfect balance. In the castle of calmness, again and again cast off

identification with earthly titles, and plunge into deep meditation to realize

your divine kingship.

Look within yourself. Remember, the Infinite is everywhere. Diving deep

into superconsciousness,8 you can speed your mind through eternity; by the

power of mind you can go farther than the farthest star. The searchlight of

mind is fully equipped to throw its superconscious rays into the innermost

heart of Truth. Use it to do so.

Remember, it is you who must travel to the kingdom of heaven; it will not

come to you by special delivery. Each man has to hie his own way alone.

From this day make a resolution in your heart to seek God. When many

devotees follow the path to Him, there will arise a “United States of the

World,”9 with God and His love as man’s Director and Guide.

I want to give you more than the temporary inspiration of words alone; I

want to shoot star-shells of wisdom straight into your spiritual darkness,

that by their bursting light you may see for yourself the truth of what I have

said.

The Two Paths: Activity and Meditation

To summarize, there are basically two approaches to God-realization: the

outer way and the inner, or transcendental way. The outer way is by right

activity, loving and serving mankind with the consciousness centered in

God; the transcendental way is by deep esoteric meditation. By the

transcendental way you realize all the things you are not, and discover That

which you are: “I am not the breath; I am not the body, neither bones nor

flesh. I am not the mind or feeling. I am That which is behind the breath,

body, mind, and feeling.” When you go beyond the consciousness of this

world, knowing that you are not the body or the mind, and yet aware as

never before that you exist—that divine consciousness is what you are. You

are That in which is rooted everything in the universe.

Why not inquire behind the darkness when you close your eyes? That is the

place to explore. “And the light shineth in the darkness; and the darkness

comprehended it not.”10 Vast lights and cosmic forces are moving there.

Skyfuls of Eternal Bliss Will Be Opened

Samadhi11 is a joyous experience, a splendid light in which you behold the

countless worlds floating in a vast bed of joy and bliss. Banish the spiritual

ignorance that makes you think this mortal life is real. Have these beautiful

experiences for yourself in eternal samadhi, in God. Auroras of light,

skyfuls of eternal bliss will be opened to you.

All great teachers declare that within this body is the immortal soul, a spark

of That which sustains all. He who knows his soul knows this truth: “I am

beyond everything finite; I now see that the Spirit, alone in space with Its

ever new joy, has expressed Itself as the vast body of nature. I am the stars,

I am the waves, I am the Life of all; I am the laughter within all hearts, I am

the smile on the faces of flowers and in each soul. I am the Wisdom and

Power that sustain all creation.”

Realize that! My words may remain vibrating within you; but if you sleep

on in delusion, you will not know it. If you awaken, you will be conscious

that the truth I have spoken is ever throbbing within your soul. Meditate.

Learn this liberating lesson. Wait no more. I came here not to entertain you

with worldly festivities12 but to arouse your sleeping memory of

immortality. You do not realize the pain that comes to those who remain in

delusion. I suffer for you, and will do everything to help you realize that

illumination is within.

Free yourself forever!

1 From the Sanskrit vid, “to know.” The Vedas comprise a voluminous

scripture of 100,000 couplets. The origin of the Vedas is lost in antiquity.

They were passed down orally for millenniums. According to tradition, the

illumined sage Vyasa, who lived at the time of Bhagavan Krishna (see

Bhagavan Krishna in glossary), was the compiler and arranger of the Vedas

in their present form: Rig Veda, Sama Veda, Yajur Veda, and Atharva Veda.

2 Literally “seers.” The rishis were the inspired personages to whom the

Vedas were revealed in an indeterminable antiquity.

3 “They are true knowers...who understand the Day of Brahma, which

endures for a thousand cycles (yugas), and the Night of Brahma, which also

endures for a thousand cycles. At the dawn of Brahma’s Day all creation,

reborn, emerges from the state of non-manifestation; at the dusk of

Brahma’s Night all creation sinks into the sleep of non-manifestation”

(Bhagavad Gita VIII:17–18).

4 “…for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21).

5 Meditation is that special form of concentration in which the attention has
been liberated, by scientific yoga techniques, from the restlessness of the
body-conscious state and is focused unfalteringly on God. Meditation is the
concentrated flow of one’s attention and consciousness toward communion
and oneness with God.
6 “Let man uplift the self (ego) by the self; let the self not be self-degraded.
For him whose self (ego) has been conquered by the Self (soul), the Self is
the friend of the self; but verily, the Self behaves inimically, as an enemy,
toward the self that is not subdued” (Bhagavad Gita VI:5–6).
7 Cosmic illusion; “the measurer.” Maya is the magical power in creation
by which limitations and divisions are apparently present in the
Immeasurable and Inseparable. In God’s plan and play (lila), the sole
function of this delusive power is to cast a veil of ignorance over man to
divert his awareness from Spirit to matter, from Reality to unreality.
8 Soul consciousness, which is intuitive and all-knowing. The
superconscious mind is thus the omniscient power of the soul. (See also
spiritual eye in glossary.)
9 As the individual states of America maintain independence and yet are
united in common ideals and goals, so if God’s kingdom is to come on
earth, the various countries of the world must similarly unite in a bond of
harmonious cooperation and brotherhood.
10 John 1:5.
11 Spiritual ecstasy; state of God-union experienced as the ultimate goal of
meditation.
12 As a part of his effort to foster a broader understanding between the
cultures of East and West, Paramahansa Yogananda occasionally arranged
social gatherings at the Self-Realization Fellowship International
Headquarters. He refers here to a “Hindu-American Banquet” that was to
follow this talk.

Paramahansa Yogananda in New York, 1926

The Universality of Yoga

Self-Realization Fellowship Temple, Hollywood, California, May 21, 1944

Yoga is a system of scientific methods for reuniting the soul with the Spirit.

We have come down from God, and we must reascend to Him. We have

seemingly become separated from our Father, and we must consciously

reunite with Him. Yoga teaches us how to rise above the delusion of

separation and realize our oneness with God. The poet Milton wrote of the

soul of man and how it might regain paradise. That is the purpose and goal

of Yoga—to regain the lost paradise of soul consciousness by which man

knows that he is, and ever has been, one with Spirit.

The world’s various religions are based more or less on the beliefs of man.

But the true basis of religion should be a science that all devotees may

apply in order to reach our one Father-God. Yoga is that science. The

practice of a science of religion is imperative. Different dogmatic “isms”

have kept mankind divided, although Jesus pointed out: “If a house be

divided against itself, that house cannot stand.”1 Unity among various

religions may be brought about only when the individuals who practice

those religions become actually aware of God within. Then we shall have a

true brotherhood of man under the Fatherhood of God.

The great religions of the world all preach the necessity of finding God, of

brotherhood among men; and all have a moral code, such as the Ten

Commandments. What, then, creates the differences among them? It is the

bigotry in men’s minds. Not by concentrating on dogma may we reach God,

but by actual soul knowledge. When men perceive the universal truths

underlying various religions, there will be no more difficulties over dogma.

To me there is neither Jew, nor Christian, nor Hindu; all are my brothers. I

worship in all temples, for each of them has been erected to honor my

Father.

We should begin to build world unity with the idea that has been initiated

by Self-Realization Fellowship: a “Church of All Religions”; not

eclecticism, but respect for all religions as constituting various paths to

God. Such temples, dedicated to the one God that all religions worship,

should be built everywhere. I predict that this will come about. East and

West should destroy forever narrow divisions in the houses of God.

Attaining Self-realization through Yoga, men will come to know that they

are all children of the one Father.

The Blind Cannot Lead the Blind

That unity of spirit is demonstrated in great men, those with God-

realization. The blind cannot lead the blind; only a master,2 one who knows

God, may rightly teach others about Him. To regain one’s divinity one must

have such a master or guru.3 He who faithfully follows a true guru becomes

like him, for the guru helps to elevate the disciple to his own level of

realization. When I found my guru, Swami Sri Yukteswarji,4 I made up my

mind to follow his example: to place God alone on the altar of my heart,

and to share Him with others.

The Hindu masters taught that to gain the deepest knowledge one should

focus his gaze through the omniscient spiritual eye. When concentrating

hard, even the non-yogi wrinkles his forehead at the point between the

eyebrows—the center of concentration and of the spherical spiritual eye, the

seat of soul intuition. That is the real “crystal ball” into which the yogi

gazes to learn the secrets of the universe. Those who go deep enough in

their concentration will penetrate that “third” eye and see God. Seekers of

truth therefore should develop the ability to project their perception through

the spiritual eye. The practice of Yoga helps the aspirant to open the single

eye of intuitive consciousness.5

Intuition or direct knowledge does not depend on any data from the senses.

That is why the intuitive faculty is often called the “sixth sense.” Everyone

has this sixth sense, but most people do not develop it. However, almost

everyone has had some intuitional experience, perhaps a “feeling” that a

particular thing is going to happen, when there is no sensory evidence to

indicate it.

It is important to develop intuition, or direct soul knowledge, for he who is

God-conscious is sure of himself. He knows, and he knows that he knows.

We must be sure of God’s presence, as sure as we are that we know the taste

of an orange. It was only after my Guru had shown me how to commune

with God and after I had felt His presence every day that I assumed the

spiritual duty of telling others about Him.

The West has emphasized large temples of worship, but there are few in

which the worshipers are shown how God may be found. In the East, the

emphasis has been on the development of men of God-realization; but they

are in many cases inaccessible to spiritual seekers, remaining in seclusion in

remote and solitary abodes. Spiritual centers in which people may

commune with God, and teachers who can show people how to do so, are

both necessary. How may one receive knowledge of God from a teacher

who himself does not know God? My Guru impressed upon me the

necessity of knowing the Heavenly Father before trying to tell others about

Him. How grateful I am to have received his training! He himself truly

communed with God.

The Lord must first be perceived in one’s own bodily temple. Every seeker

should daily discipline his thoughts and place on the altar of his soul the

wildflowers of his devotion. He who finds God within will be able to feel

His presence in every church or temple he enters.

Yoga Converts Theology to Practical Experience

Yoga enables man to perceive the truth in all religions. The Ten

Commandments are preached, in various words, in every religion. But the

two greatest commandments are those emphasized by Jesus: “Love the

Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy

mind,” and “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.”6

Loving God “with all thy mind” means withdrawing one’s attention from

the senses and giving it to God; giving to Him one’s whole concentration in

meditation. Every seeker of God must learn to concentrate. A prayer that

one utters while at the same time thinking of other things in the background

of the mind is not a true prayer and is unheeded by God. Yoga teaches that

in order to find the Father it is first necessary to seek Him with all one’s

mind, with concentration that is one-pointed.

Some people say that the Hindus are more adapted to the practice of Yoga,

that Yoga is not suited to Westerners. This is not true. Many Westerners are

at present in a better position to practice Yoga than many Hindus are,

because scientific advancements have given Westerners much free time.

India should more and more utilize the progressive material methods of the

West to make life easier and freer; and the West should take from India the

practical metaphysical methods of Yoga whereby every man may find his

way to God. Yoga is not a sect but a universally applicable science by

which we can find our Father.

Yoga is for everybody, for the people of the West as well as for those of the

East. One would not say that the telephone is not for the East just because it

was invented in the West. Similarly, the methods of Yoga, although

developed in the East, are not exclusively for the East but are useful to all

mankind.

Whether a man is born in India or in America, he someday has to die. Why

not learn how to “die daily” in God, like St. Paul?7 Yoga teaches the

method. Man lives in the body as a prisoner; when his term is over, he

suffers the indignity of being thrown out. Love of the body is therefore

nothing more than love of jail. Long accustomed to living in the body, we

have forgotten what real freedom means. Being a Westerner is no excuse for

not seeking freedom. It is vital to every man that he discover his soul and

know his immortal nature. Yoga shows the way.

The Soul Must Reascend to God

Before creation existed there was Cosmic Consciousness: Spirit or God, the

Absolute, ever-existing, ever-conscious, ever-new Bliss beyond form and

manifestation. When creation came into being, Cosmic Consciousness

“descended” into the physical universe where it manifests as Christ

Consciousness:8 the omnipresent pure reflection of God’s intelligence and

consciousness inherent and hidden within all creation. When the Christ

Consciousness descends into the physical body of man it becomes soul, or

superconsciousness: the ever-existing, ever-conscious, ever-new bliss of

God individualized by encasement in the body. When the soul becomes

identified with the body, it manifests as ego, mortal consciousness. Yoga

teaches that the soul must climb back up the ladder of consciousness to

Spirit.9

Secret of Happiness Is Consciousness of God’s Presence

It is all right to enjoy life; the secret of happiness is not to become attached

to anything. Enjoy the smell of the flower, but see God in it. I have kept the

consciousness of the senses only that in using them I may always perceive

and think of God. “Mine eyes were made to behold Thy beauty everywhere.

My ears were made to hear Thine omnipresent voice.” That is yoga, union

with God. It is not necessary to go to the forest to find Him. Worldly habits

will hold us fast wherever we may be until we free ourselves from them.

The yogi learns to find God in the cave of his heart. Wherever he goes, he

carries with him the blissful consciousness of God’s presence.

Man has not only descended into mortal sense consciousness but has

become bound by abnormalities of that sense consciousness, such as greed,

anger, and jealousy. Man must banish these abnormalities in order to find

God. Both Easterners and Westerners should be free from sense slavery. An

ordinary man may become angry because his morning coffee hasn’t been

brought to him and he is sure the deprivation will give him a headache. He

is a slave of his habits. The developed yogi is free.

Everyone can be a yogi, right where he is now. But we are prone to think

strange and difficult anything that is beyond the horizon of our own habits

of life. We do not consider how our habits may appear to others!

The practice of Yoga leads to freedom. Some yogis carry this idea of non-

attachment to extremes. They teach that one should be able to lie on a bed

of nails without discomfort, and other forms of tapasya, physical discipline.

It is true that one who can sit on a bed of nails and think of God shows great

strength of mind. But such feats are not necessary. One may just as well sit

in a comfortable chair and meditate on God.

Patanjali10 teaches that any posture that keeps the spine erect is good for

meditation, yogic concentration on God. It is not necessary to go through

physical contortions or to practice exercises requiring extraordinary

physical endurance and suppleness, as is advocated in Hatha Yoga. God is

the objective; consciousness of His presence is what we should work

toward. The Bhagavad Gita says: “He who with devotion absorbs himself in

Me, with his soul immersed in Me, him I regard, among all classes of yogis,

as the most equilibrated.”11

Hindu yogis have been known to demonstrate obliviousness to extremes of

heat and cold, and to mosquitoes and other annoying insects. Such a

demonstration is not a requisite of being a yogi, but it is natural

achievement of the adept. Try to eliminate disturbing elements; or to endure

them, if necessary, without being disturbed inwardly by them. If one can

remain clean, it is pointless to be dirty. One may become attached to living

in a hut as well as to living in a palace.

The greatest factor in achieving spiritual success is willingness. Jesus said,

“The harvest truly is plenteous, but the laborers are few.”12 People of the

world seek the gifts of God, but he who is wise seeks the Giver Himself.

To be a yogi is to meditate. The yogi doesn’t think first of food for his body

upon waking each morning; he feeds his soul with the ambrosia of God-

communion. Filled with the inspiration found by his deeply diving

meditative mind, he is able to perform happily all the duties of the day.

God made this earth as it is on purpose; in His plan it is man’s part to make

the world better. The Westerner tends to go to extremes in keeping

constantly busy getting new and improved material comforts. The Easterner

tends to go to extremes in being satisfied with what he has. There is

something appealing about both the go-ahead spirit of the West and the

easy, calm spirit of the East. We should take the balanced road between.

Meditation Makes the Yogi

To find God, one should meditate every morning and night, and whenever

there is a little spare time during the day. In addition, it is important to

meditate for six hours on one day out of the week. This is not unreasonable;

some people practice at the piano for ten hours every day of the week, and

think nothing of it. To become a spiritual master, it is necessary to give

more time to God. We have to make Him feel that we love Him more than

anything else. When you become experienced in meditation, able to go deep

into superconsciousness, five hours of sleep are enough. The rest of the

night should be used for meditation. One can use nights and early mornings

and holidays for meditating on God. In this way anyone, even the busy

Westerner, can be a yogi. So become a Western yogi. You don’t have to

wear a turban or to have long hair like me!

We need the “hives” of churches, but we also need to fill the churches with

the “honey” of our own Self-realization.13 God is present in the churches

too, of course; but your just going there will not persuade Him to reveal

Himself. Churchgoing is good, but daily meditation is better still. Do both,

because you will certainly have inspiration from going to church; and from

daily meditation you will receive even greater upliftment. It is when a

devotee’s heart is afire and when he throws shell after shell of prayer that

God surrenders to him. That unceasing devotion is essential to finding Him.

In order to be a yogi and still keep pace with the modern world, it is

necessary to meditate at home, to discipline oneself, and to perform all

duties with the attitude that they are a service to God.

My greatest desire is to build temples of God in the souls of men; to see the

smile of God on men’s faces. The most important of all life’s

accomplishments is to establish a temple of God in one’s own soul. And it

can be easily done. That is why Self-Realization Fellowship was sent to the

West.

Anyone who has established God in his soul temple is a yogi. He can say,

with me, that Yoga is for the East, North, South, and West—for all people,

that they may follow the byways of theology to join the highway of Yoga.

The right road leads to the palace of God’s bliss. He who once reaches there

shall “go no more out.”14

1 Mark 3:25.

2 One who is a master of himself—of the mind, emotions, senses, passions.

His actions, unclouded by egoistic motives, are consonant with the will of

God; and he knows himself as one with God, not in imagination but in

actual experience of Divine Omnipresence.

3 Spiritual teacher. The Guru Gita (17–19) aptly describes the guru as

“dispeller of darkness” (from gu, “darkness” and ru, “that which dispels”).

By divine right the title of guru is conferred only upon those exalted souls

who, through their own Self-realization and oneness with God, are qualified

to lead others from the darkness of ignorance to the everlasting light of

Truth.

4 In Autobiography of a Yogi, Paramahansa Yogananda describes his

association with his divine guru, whom he called a Jnanavatar, “Incarnation

of Wisdom.” Ji added at the end of a proper name or title denotes respect.

5 During deep meditation, the single or spiritual eye becomes visible as a

bright star surrounded by a sphere of blue light that, in turn, is encircled by

a brilliant halo of golden light. This omniscient eye is variously referred to

in scriptures as the third eye, the star of the East, the inner eye, the dove

descending from heaven, the eye of Shiva, and the eye of intuition. “If

therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light”

(Matthew 6:22).

6 Matthew 22:37, 39. Krishna’s teachings in the Bhagavad Gita similarly

stress these two commandments: “On Me [the Lord] fix thy mind, be thou

My devotee, with ceaseless worship bow reverently before Me. Having thus

united thyself to Me as thy Highest Goal, thou shalt be Mine Own” (IX:34);

and “The best type of yogi is he who feels for others, whether in grief or

pleasure, even as he feels for himself” (VI:32).

7 I Corinthians 15:31.

8 The Hindu scriptures refer to Christ Consciousness as Kutastha

Chaitanya, universal consciousness or omnipresent intelligence.

9 Yoga teaches that the abode of the soul—of man’s life and divine

consciousness—is in the subtle spiritual centers in the brain: Sahasrara, the

thousand-petaled lotus at the top of the cerebrum, seat of cosmic

consciousness; Kutastha, at the point between the eyebrows, seat of Christ

consciousness; and the medullary center (connected by polarity to the

Kutastha), seat of superconsciousness. Descending into the body (and body

consciousness) from these centers of highest spiritual perception, life and

consciousness flow down the spine, passing through five astral spinal

centers (see chakras in glossary) and branching outward into the physical

organs of life, sensory perception, and action.

To regain the blissful realization of its oneness with God, the soul of man

must retrace its downward course, ascending by the sacred spinal route to

its home in the higher cerebral centers of divine awareness. This is

accomplished by the practice of guru-given scientific techniques of yogic

meditation, such as may be learned from the Self-Realization Fellowship

Lessons.

10 Foremost exponent of Yoga. Patanjali’s date is unknown, though many

scholars assign him to the second century b.c.

11 VI:47.

12 Matthew 9:37.

13 Knowing one’s Self as the soul, and that the soul is one with God.

14 Revelation 3:12.

During the years 1920 through 1935, Paramahansa Yogananda conducted

extensive lectures and classes to capacity audiences in major cities across

the United States. The Los Angeles Times reported: “The Philharmonic

Auditorium presents the extraordinary spectacle of thousands being turned

away an hour before the advertised opening . . . . Swami Yogananda is the

attraction. A Hindu invading the United States to bring God in the midst of

a Christian community, preaching the essence of Christian Doctrine.”

The Infinite Nature of God

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, January 28, 1937

The Hindu scriptures state that God is beyond comprehension by mind and

intellect. Powerful as they are, their scope is insufficient to contain Him. So

the human mind is incapable of a true conception of God. The question

“Who made God?” arises only because mind cannot comprehend That

which has neither beginning nor end.

When you are looking at the sun millions of miles away in the sky, that

huge luminary seems smaller by far than our earth. Yet the diameter of earth

is roughly 7,900 miles; and the sun is more than a hundred times that wide.

If you could place our planet next to the sun, earth would appear by

comparison a tiny dot. Let us suppose the giant solar orb is expanding,

growing more and more huge, until the vast blue expanse of the sky is

entirely swallowed up by its mass. The space thus filled is nevertheless but

a particle, a mere speck, of the space that spreads through countless

universes and into infinity. Were the sun to go on endlessly enlarging in

space, still it would not be able to take the measure of infinity. The cosmic

delusion of finitude prevents the mind from conceiving such vastness.

Where are its boundaries? Whence came this endless void? The Originless

Immeasurable is God. Omnipresent in the farthest reaches of space, He is in

the distant stars, and in you and me; and He is conscious every moment of

every place He is.

God is not mind—He created it and He is beyond it. Otherwise we could

conceive Him in our minds. We can accurately call Him Divine

Consciousness, Divine Joy, Divine Existence, but not mind.

Though mind is incapable of encompassing Omnipresence, it is

nevertheless able to feel God. Feeling His presence and measuring it are

two different experiences. The wave cannot measure the ocean, but there is

a point of contact between them. So where the Infinite becomes the finite

there is a point of contact: the superconscious mind. That mind can feel

God. When we expand the ordinary mind until it impinges on the

superconscious mind, we are able to feel His presence.

We Have Descended From the Infinite Into the Finite

We have descended from the Infinite into the finite. Yoga is withdrawal of

the attention from externals in order to focus it on the inner source of Truth.

Only in this way can we discover how God has condensed His

consciousness into the multitudinous finite forms of His creatures and the

universes they inhabit. The human body is the most intricate of all His

creations. A single original cell, the united sperm and ovum, divides; and by

multiplication of the process builds up trillions of cells around itself to

create the bodily temple that houses our divine soul consciousness.

You don’t realize how much energy is locked in even one little gram of

flesh. Its release would spread countless electrons far into space.1 And the

power and extent of the consciousness that is present in the body is beyond

human conception. Though externally we are made of flesh, behind its

gross cells are electrical currents, life currents. And behind these subtle

energies are the thoughts and perceptions.

Thought is inexhaustible. Since the world began, thoughts in unimaginable

numbers have passed through the ether. One could not begin to count them,

but it is possible to get some idea if you reflect on how many thoughts and

feelings you express during your own lifetime. Millions! Try to remember

all you have thought in just one year, or even in one day. Consider the

accumulation of thoughts of every human being through unrecorded ages

past. God knows them all!

Mind cannot measure even the subtle phenomena of nature. How many

electrons whirl in the electricity that flows into the light bulbs here in the

chapel? Trillions, dancing together, make this light you behold. These

ultramicroscopic particles are moving at a speed equivalent to traveling

from here to New York, or to any other part of the world, in a few seconds.

Scientific experiments are proving this.

If you try to calculate how many protons and electrons are condensed in our

earth, the mind goes only so far and then stops. What is revealed to the

searching mind seems infinite, but there is a point beyond which ideas

become too subtle to follow. From that sphere where the mind cannot

penetrate, God is pouring forth His essential Light—the Cosmic Intelligent

Vibration that structures finite creation.

God’s True Nature Known Only Through Intuition

If we use the mind properly, we can understand how God is beyond mind

and intellect; and how His true nature can be felt only through the soul’s

power of intuition. We must find His consciousness through the

superconscious mind—the nucleus of mind and intelligence. His infinite

nature is revealed to man through the intuitive superconsciousness of the

soul. The joy felt in meditation reveals the presence of Eternal Joy spread

over all creation. The light seen in meditation is the astral light2 from which

our tangible creation is made. Beholding this light, one feels a unity with all

things.

The ordinary person lives in the world but is relatively unconscious of its

nature and purpose. A life of such limited perception is not unlike that of

the animals. We used to have here at Mt. Washington a goat that was

invariably attracted by my voice. One day, while I was speaking in this

chapel, the goat came trotting in and right on up the aisle to me! I am sure it

didn’t know what I was saying; it simply liked to hear my voice. But you

come to these lectures not only to listen to the words, but also to feel the

presence of God behind them. If you attune your consciousness with His

consciousness, and remain in that current of bliss, you will feel at-onement

with Him. Whatever understanding I have attained has been acquired by

becoming attuned to God’s consciousness within. This you too can

accomplish.

As one develops spiritually and realizes his kinship with all that lives, his

responsibility to share the suffering of others increases. Jesus was willing

even to suffer in sharing the afflictions of others; we too must do what we

can for those who are shivering with cold and disease. It is a nightmare for

them; and whatever of their woes we can remove, we are removing them

from God also. He is not happy when His children are in misery, for He

suffers in them.

At this moment most of you are enjoying beauty and peace, but think of

those in Louisville today! Thousands are suffering there because of the

floods. Once long ago I was thinking how wonderful America is, without

the disasters that afflict so many countries; then God showed me the floods

that are occurring now. The vibrations of the thoughts3 and feelings of

thousands being killed in the fighting in Spain have caused atmospheric

changes that are responsible for these floods and other disasters around the

world. War spews out vibrations of wrong that throw all nature out of

balance and harmony, causing “natural” catastrophes.

God gave freedom to man, and man has misused that freedom; this is the

cause of all suffering. The misuse of our God-given free will has terrifying

consequences. I would rather someone tell me that I am about to do wrong,

than allow me to act and not wake up until years later to the harm I had

done.

Satan Created Ignorance, Cause of All Suffering

Suffering is therefore not the work of God, but of Satan’s power of maya,

delusion. This force creates the ignorance that blinds people to the

consequences of their actions, causing them to err and thus bring suffering

upon themselves. Those who are fighting in Spain—both the government

forces and their opponents—think they are trying to do right. The only way

to avoid error is to develop the discriminative wisdom to know what is

wrong, and then resolve not to do it. One wrong fighting another wrong

doesn’t make a right. The true enemy of man is ignorance. It must be driven

from this earth.

We have everything necessary in the world today to bring about the

millennium. Only man’s selfishness makes it impossible. Tremendous

unnecessary suffering is created by man’s shortsighted self-interest. Money

that could feed and clothe needy people is used instead for destruction. The

root cause of the world’s troubles is this selfishness born of ignorance. Each

person thinks he is doing right; but when he seeks to satisfy only his own

interest, he is setting in motion the karmic law4 of cause and effect that will

inevitably destroy his own and others’ happiness.

The more I see of world tragedies caused by man’s ignorance, the more I

realize that even if every street were paved with gold, happiness would not

be lasting. Happiness lies in making others happy, in forsaking self-interest

to bring joy to others. If each one would do that, then everyone would be

happy; and all would be taken care of. That is what Jesus meant when he

said: “All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye

even so to them.”5

A federation of all religions and all nations is necessary. But such a union

will come only when every individual engages in that meditation which

leads to direct contact with God. Communion with Him is the solution.

When one has realized God, he no longer feels that others are different from

himself. Unless such wisdom comes, not to just a few, but to all men, there

will be no freedom on earth. Even here in America freedom is not total;

suffering still abounds. Each one of us has a responsibility to bring peace

and happiness to our country and to all men. One should care, not only for

his own nation, but all countries; not only for one’s own family, but for all

mankind. The ordinary man’s interest is limited to himself and his

surroundings, but the man of God identifies with the whole world. Don’t

think the contribution made by your spiritualized consciousness is small.

Your part may mean very much.

In order to know God you must become like Him. In spite of our

transgressions, in spite of our forgetfulness of God and great indifference to

Him, still He lovingly gives us life and all that supports life in this world.

Nothing is greater than God; indifference to Him is the highest sin.

Those who are not willing to give up all they have to find Him, will not

know Him. Whoever would know God must be able to forsake all else for

Him. Jesus was trying to make his disciples understand this truth when he

told them to keep watch and pray with him at Gethsemane. But when they

fell asleep, he sadly observed: “The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is

weak.”6

Man is like a puppet. The strings of his habits, emotions, passions, and

senses make him dance to their bidding. They bind his soul. He who is

unwilling or unable to cut himself free in order to know God will not find

Him. I see myself apart from these attachments. I eat, and sometimes I don’t

eat; I sleep, and sometimes I don’t sleep. I gave up all physical necessities

to prove to myself that I do not need them. God doesn’t eat or sleep; He

isn’t bound by senses and habits. That is what makes Him God; and we are

made in His image. We should be able to give up everything to know Him:

“Seek ye the kingdom of God; and all these things shall be added unto

you.”7 Despite all the tests I have gone through for Him, in the end God has

given me everything I wanted or needed of this world. And I have given it

all back, for He has bestowed on me a gift infinitely greater: Divine Joy,

day and night. In that Joy all desires that come into my heart are satisfied.

Meditation Lifts the Fog of Ignorance

In the Bhagavad Gita, recorded by Sage Vyasa, Lord Krishna explains that

if your innate wisdom is covered over with ignorance, you are deluded and

thus stumble through life: “Tamasic [ignorant] action is that which is

instituted through delusion, without measuring one’s ability, and

disregarding the consequences—loss to oneself of health, wealth, and

influence, and harm to others.”8 When the fog of ignorance is removed by

meditation you will see the right path. You will be troubled no more; you

will find fulfillment eternal. “Verily, nothing else in this world is as

sanctifying as wisdom. In due course of time, the devotee who is successful

in yoga [meditation] will spontaneously realize this within his Self.”9

These truths are all real to me. Truth is Reality. Self-realization is not

something one can learn from books; it comes only through personal

experience. Realization of truth, experience of God—not dogma merely—is

what every religion should bring to its followers. What Jesus Christ

realized, we too must experience. He didn’t teach that his followers should

worship him as a personality, but rather experience what he experienced in

his oneness with God. That can be attained only by meditation and by

following God’s laws. To worship Jesus because he is Jesus is not enough.

Embrace the universal ideals he taught, and strive to be like him.

We are here on earth in this particular body-form for just a little while, to

learn our lessons and move on. Whither are we headed now? Think how

many pages have already been turned in the Lord’s dream novel of creation!

When I visited Salt Lake City I saw in vision a great ocean, and mammoths

walking on the shore. Later I learned that the skeleton of an ancient

mammoth had recently been found there.

As human beings we have God-given power to cast away every habit and

limitation and spread our consciousness throughout creation, penetrating

not only the hearts of all creatures, but reaching out beyond the stars. Our

native vastness encompasses even greater space. Such tremendous

possibility lies within us! We are infinite! I live in that sphere of infinity,

and am conscious of the body only once in a while.

You are limited now; but when by deep, daily meditation you become able

to transfer your consciousness from the finite to the Infinite, you will be

free. You are not meant to be a prisoner of the body. You are a child of God;

you must live up to that divine birthright.

Give God First Place in Your Heart

Wherever your mind is, that is where you will spend your time. What if

God had not given you the power to play or read or work? You could do

nothing. So He should come first in your life. God knows what is in your

heart; give Him first place there.

The only way to catch God is by love. Meditate upon Him, and then deeply

pray: “Lord, I cannot live without You. You are the Power behind my

consciousness. I love You. Reveal Yourself to me.” When you give up sleep

to meditate upon Him, when you forsake selfishness and cry because of His

suffering in your brothers, He comes to you. When you actually sacrifice

for Him, He is caught in the net of your love. Nothing else can capture Him.

Knowledge prepares the way to love. You cannot love that which you do

not know. Knowledge of God must therefore precede love for Him. That

knowledge comes by practice of Kriya Yoga,10 the technique that Lahiri

Mahasaya gave. When you know God, you will love Him; and when you

love Him, you will surrender yourself to Him.

Until your devotion for God and awareness of Him become complete, don’t

rest; don’t give in to sleep when you should be meditating. Never give

anything preference before God! His love is the greatest love there is. So

long as you let other things come first, He will wait. But your delay may be

too long, and your suffering may be great. Don’t procrastinate. Be certain in

the sincerity of your conscience that you have made the effort to commune

with Him. Don’t rest, don’t give up until you can see Him with your own

eyes, or feel Him in your heart. Birth, play, marriage, children, old age—life

is finished. That is not living! Life is much deeper and more wonderful than

that, I have found. When you know God, there is no more sorrow. All those

you loved and lost in death are with you again in the Eternal Life. You don’t

know whom to consider your “own” anymore, because everyone is yours.

The beauty of God is vast. To enjoy flowers for their loveliness is good, but

far greater is to see behind their purity and beauty the face of God. To be

carried away by music for its own sake cannot compare with hearing God’s

creative Voice in it. Though God is immanent in the finite beauties of

creation, it is wisdom to realize one’s eternal Self beyond form and finitude.

You know how fond I am of our grounds at the Mount Washington and

Encinitas ashrams.11 I never tire of their beauty. But the Lord gave me an

awakening experience recently. I inwardly saw people sitting about and

talking. One of them proposed some activity, but another said, “No,

Paramahansaji taught that we must not do that.” I suddenly realized that this

was a vision of years to come, after I was no longer here in this body. For a

moment I was shaken; then I came back to ordinary consciousness.

There is no use in becoming attached to anything in this world. So many

things come and go in the Lord’s cosmic drama. I see airfields destroyed,

and the sea filled with dead, and many other things to come. In my heart I

see a world without me. That freedom God gives ultimately to every soul.

One great saint said, “I care not where I may be, O Lord, but punish me not

with obliviousness of Thee.” There is no greater punishment. Jesus said: “It

is better for thee to enter into life maimed.”12 All suffering can be taken

away by the contact of God.

Awake From the Nightmare of Suffering

In a dream you may see yourself running down a street, pursued by an

enemy. Suddenly you are shot, and you think, “Oh, how terrible! I am

dying! I am sad to leave this world.” Then you see yourself dead. The

undertaker cremates your body, and your friends come to mourn when the

ashes are laid away. But suddenly you wake up and see that it was only a

dream. You are alive! This is similar to what happens at death.

God showed me in a vision that those who are dying in the fighting in Spain

are only dreaming a terrible dream of death. As soon as their consciousness

is lifted from the body, they awake as from a nightmare, and are glad to be

free of it. Our life experiences are all part of a dream. Man himself has

created the nightmare of war. But after its victims have been thrown from

their bodies, they realize it was only a horrible dream from which they have

awakened. They know they are not dead. This is a great metaphysical truth.

If you know you are dreaming, you don’t suffer from your bad experiences

in the dream. But if you are identified with the dream, and in it someone

strikes your head and kills you, that dream death seems a true and terrible

experience until you wake up and understand it was not real. It is the same

after death. Once you are out of this body, you realize you are not dead; you

are free of a nightmare. So death is not the end; it is a freeing of the

consciousness from imprisonment in the physical dream-body. That release

brings a sense of great freedom. We should never seek death. Rather, we

should prepare our consciousness by meditation and God-communion, so

that when death comes, in its own time, we are able to look upon it as a

dream, nothing more. I can see the dream nature of life and death anytime I

wish. Hence I attach little importance to this body.

In Oneness With God Know That Life Is a Dream

Live in the consciousness of Spirit, in that oneness with God wherein you

know that life is a dream. It is very easy to do when you make the effort.

When suffering comes it is more difficult to detach your consciousness

from identification with the body; so be wise and make the effort now,

while you have strength and health.

Material desires take away the desire for the Infinite. Every day or so

someone tells me I need this or that. It seems ridiculous, because I know

that thousands do not have what I am told I “need.” If they don’t need it,

why should I? Your only real need is God; there is no other necessity. Be

not attached to possessions, music, books, food, or any other sense

pleasures. In God you have eternal life. Become aware of this great truth;

otherwise your appointments in life will take over, and you will die still

bound by them. If you are one with Him, you are not compelled to return to

this dream earth again. You are free to come and go as you like,13 to serve

God in His children on earth.

If you live in the joy of God, you will not know what death is. You do not

get to that state when you pray mechanically. Become completely absorbed

in your prayer, with faith that God is listening. If you thus fervently,

lovingly pray to God, He will come to you at any time.

1 The awesome power of the release of nuclear energy was first

demonstrated under controlled conditions within a few years after this talk,

when the first atomic bomb was exploded at Alamogordo, New Mexico, on

July 16, 1945.

2 Everything on the material plane has a counterpart made of astral light, a

light that is more subtle than the electromagnetic energies of the atom.

Hindu scriptures call this energy prana, which Paramahansa Yogananda has

translated as “lifetrons.”

3 The power of thought, for good or ill, derives from the thought-essence of

the universe. In manifesting creation, God first projects it as thought-

patterns, the finest form of creative vibration, which condenses into forms

of astral light and then into grosser atomic structures. Remove the primal

thought of God and creation dissolves. Man’s thoughts are a microcosmic

borrowing from God’s thought power and so have the ability, even when

undeveloped, to affect significantly his own health, happiness, and success

and, when strongly reinforced by kindred thoughts of others, the world in

which he lives. The thought-patterns implanted in creation by God are thus

affected harmoniously or inharmoniously by the thoughts of mankind. (See

karma in glossary.)

4 Karma is the law of action and reaction. Whatever man sows by his

behavior he will reap in like measure, in this life or in succeeding ones.

(See karma in glossary.)

5 Matthew 7:12.
6 Matthew 26:41.
7 Luke 12:31.
8 XVIII:25.
9 Ibid. IV:38.
10 Kriya Yoga means union (yoga) with the Infinite through a certain action
or rite (kriya). Specifically, it is a meditation technique through which the
divine union can be realized. Lahiri Mahasaya, guru of Paramahansa
Yogananda’s guru, played a key role in the revival in this age of the ancient
Kriya Yoga science. (See Kriya Yoga in glossary; see also Autobiography
of a Yogi, chapter 26.)
11 An ashram is a spiritual hermitage; often a monastery. Mt. Washington
Ashram Center is the international headquarters of Self-Realization
Fellowship (Yogoda Satsanga Society of India), located on Mt. Washington
in Los Angeles. The Ashram Center in Encinitas, California, is a branch of
Self-Realization Fellowship.
12 Mark 9:43. I.e., maimed of all desires and habits that prevent man from
thinking of God.
13 The doctrine of reincarnation provides the only plausible explanation for
the seeming injustices in inequalities among men—all of whom are God’s
beloved children. The soul, all-perfect and ever-perfect, is compelled by the
law of evolution to incarnate repeatedly in progressively higher lives—
retarded by wrong actions and desires and accelerated by spiritual
endeavors—until Self-realization and God-union are attained. Having then
transcended the Lord’s delusion, the soul is forever freed. “Their thoughts
immersed in That (Spirit), their souls one with Spirit, their sole allegiance
and devotion given to Spirit, their beings purified from poisonous delusion
by the antidote of wisdom—such men reach the state of nonreturn”
(Bhagavad Gita V:17). In the Bible it is similarly written: “Him that
overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go no

more out” (Revelation 3:12). A soul who returns to earth after attaining

liberation, incarnates of his own free will as a master, to help liberate

others. Such voluntary returns are called vyutthana, reversion to earthly life

after maya has ceased to blind. Such incarnations are rare in any age.

Answered Prayers

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, October 19, 1939

Having come to this world from we know not where, we naturally wonder

about the origin and purpose of life. We hear about a Creator, read about

Him, but know not any way to contact Him. We only know that the entire

universe depicts His intelligence. Just as the intricate works of a tiny watch

arouse our admiration for the watchmaker, and the huge complicated

machines in a factory cause us to marvel at their inventor, so when we see

nature’s wonders we feel awed by the hidden intelligence behind them. We

ask ourselves: Who made the flower a living form, reaching out to the sun?

Whence came its fragrance and beauty? How were its petals formed so

perfectly, and tinged with lovely colors?

At night the stars and the moon, shedding silvery light around us, move us

to reflection on the intelligence guiding these celestial bodies through the

sky. The moon’s soft light is insufficient for the activities of the day; thus a

benign intelligence suggests to us that we rest at night. Then the sun comes

up, and its bright light makes us look clearly and squarely at the world

around us, and at our responsibility to satisfy the needs that beset us.

There are two ways in which our needs can be taken care of. One is the

material. For example, when we have ill health we can go to a doctor for

medical treatment. But a time comes when no human aid can help. Then we

look to the other way, to the Spiritual Power, the Maker of our body, mind,

and soul. Material power is limited, and when it fails, we turn to the

unlimited Divine Power. Likewise with our financial needs; when we have

done our best, and still it is inadequate, we turn to that other Power.

Everyone thinks that his problems are the worst. Some feel more oppressed

than others because their resistance is weaker. Because of differences in

their mental power, people put forth varying amounts of energy. If one has a

very great difficulty and his mind is weak, he will not succeed in

overcoming the problem. A man whose mind is powerful could break down

the barriers of that difficulty. Even so, the mightiest men have sometimes

met failure. When overwhelming material, mental, or spiritual troubles

beset us, we realize how limited are the powers of life in this physical

world.

Our endeavor must be not only to acquire financial security and good

health, but to seek out the meaning of life. What is it all about? When we

are hit with difficulties we react upon our environment first, making

whatever material adjustments we believe may help. But when we come to

the point of saying, “Everything I have tried so far has failed; what to do

next?” we start to think hard about a solution. When we think deeply

enough, we find an answer within. This is one form of answered prayer.

Prayer Is a Demand of the Soul

Prayer is a demand of the soul. God did not make us beggars; He created us

in His image. The Bible and Hindu scriptures declare it. A beggar who goes

to a rich home and asks for alms receives a beggar’s share; but the son can

have anything he asks from his wealthy father. Therefore we should not

behave like beggars. Divine ones such as Christ, Krishna, and Buddha did

not lie when they said we are made in the image of God.

Yet we see that some people have everything, seemingly born with a silver

spoon in their mouth, whereas others seem to attract failure and troubles.

Where is the image of God in them? The power of Spirit lies within each

one of us; the question is how to develop it. If you will follow the lesson in

my experiences with God, you are bound to find the result you are seeking.

In the past you may have been disappointed that your prayers were not

answered. But do not lose faith. In order to find out if prayers work or not,

you must have in your mind an initial belief in the power of prayer.

Your prayers may have gone unanswered because you chose to be a beggar.

Also, you should know what you may legitimately ask of your Heavenly

Father. You may pray with all your heart and power to own the earth, but

your prayer will not be granted, because all prayers connected with material

life are limited; they have to be. God will not break His laws to satisfy

whimsical desires. But there is a right way to pray. The cat is said to have

nine lives; difficulties have ninety-nine! You have to find the one sure way

of killing the cat of difficulties. The secret of effective prayer is to change

your status from beggar to child of God; when you appeal to Him from that

consciousness, your prayer will have both power and wisdom.

In Will Power Lies the Germ of Success

Most people become extremely nervous or tense when they are trying to

accomplish something that means a great deal to them. Anxious, nervous

actions do not draw the power of God; but continuous, calm, powerful use

of the will shakes the forces of creation and brings a response from the

Infinite. The germ of success in whatever you want to accomplish is in your

will power. Will that has been badly battered by difficulties becomes

temporarily paralyzed. The resolute man who says, “My body may be

broken, but my head of will power remains unbowed,” demonstrates the

greatest expression of will.

Will power is what makes you divine. When you give up using that will,

you become a mortal man. Many people say we should not exercise our will

to change conditions, lest we interfere with God’s plan. But why would God

give us will if we are not to use it? I once met a fanatical man who said he

did not believe in using will power because it developed the ego. “You are

using a lot of will now to resist me!” I replied. “You are using it to talk, and

you are obliged to use your will to stand, or walk, or eat, or go to the

movies, or even to go to sleep. You will everything you do. Without will

power you would be a mechanical man.” Non-use of the will is not what

Jesus meant when he said: “Not as I will, but as Thou wilt.”1 He was

demonstrating that man must learn to bend his will, which is governed by

desires, to the will of God. Therefore right prayer, when it is persistent, is

will.

You must believe in the possibility of what you are praying for. If you want

a home, and the mind says, “You simpleton, you can’t afford a house,” you

must make your will stronger. When the “can’t” disappears from your mind,

divine power comes. A home will not be dropped down to you from

heaven; you have to pour forth will power continuously through

constructive actions. When you persist, refusing to accept failure, the object

of will must materialize. When you continuously work that will through

your thoughts and activities, what you are wishing for has to come about.

Even though there is nothing in the world to conform to your wish, when

your will persists, the desired result will somehow manifest. In that kind of

will lies God’s answer; because will comes from God, and continuous will

is divine will.

Cauterize the “Can’ts” in Your Brain

A weak will is a mortal will. As soon as trials and failure cut it off, it loses

its connection with the dynamo of the Infinite. But behind human will is the

divine will that can never fail. Even death has no power to deter divine will.

The Lord will definitely answer that prayer behind which the will force is

continuous. Most people are mentally or physically lazy, or both. When

they want to pray, they think instead of sleep, and when the head nods they

dive into bed and that is the end of prayer. The will is buried. Mortal man’s

brain is full of “can’ts.” Being born in a family with certain characteristics

and habits, he is influenced by these to think he can’t do certain things; he

can’t walk much, he can’t eat this, he can’t stand that. Those “can’ts” have

to be cauterized. You have within you the power to accomplish everything

you want; that power lies in the will.

Whoever would develop will power must have good company. If your

desire is to become a great mathematician, and your customary associates

all dislike mathematics, you will certainly be discouraged. But when you

mix with accomplished mathematicians, your will is reinforced; you think,

“If others can do it, I can do it.”

Don’t immediately jump into big things in your eagerness to develop your

will. To succeed, first try out your will on some little thing you thought you

could not do. If you work hard at it, you can be successful. I remember all

the goals my friends and many others told me I could never accomplish, but

I did. Such “well-wishers” can do much harm. God save us from their kind!

Company has the greatest influence on will. If instead of coming here, you

went to a drinking party every Thursday, you could not help but pick up

something of that worldly vibration. Your will is definitely inspired or

weakened by your company. To develop will by yourself is extremely

difficult. You require an example before you. If you would be an artist,

surround yourself with good paintings and artists. If you would be a divine

man, surround yourself with spiritual company.

Belief and experience are quite different. A belief comes from what you

have heard or read and accepted as fact, but experience is something you

have actually perceived. The convictions of those who have experienced

God cannot be shaken. If you had never tasted an orange, I could fool you

about its characteristics; but if you had already eaten one, I could not

deceive you. You would know; you would have had the experience of it.

Seek the Company of Those Who Strengthen Your Faith

Thoughts about God, success, healing, and so on lie in your brain in the

form of tabloid tendencies. You should experience them. In order to

experience your thoughts you must use will power to materialize them, and

in order to develop the necessary strength of will, you must associate with

those who have great will power. If you want healing by God’s power, seek

the company of those who strengthen your faith and your will.

I traveled throughout India trying to find someone who knew God. Such

souls are rare. All the teachers I met told me about their beliefs. But in

spiritual matters I was determined never to be satisfied with words about

God. I wanted to experience Him. What I am told has no meaning for me

unless I experience it.

Once I was talking with a friend of mine, a broker, about the saints of India.

He did not share my enthusiasm. “All these so-called saints are fakes,” he

said. “They don’t know God.”

I didn’t argue; I changed the subject, and we started to talk about the

brokerage business. When he had told me quite a great deal about it, I said

smoothly, “Do you know there is not a single reliable broker in Calcutta?

They are all dishonest.”

“What do you know about brokers?” he retorted angrily.

“Exactly,” I replied. “What do you know about saints?” He couldn’t answer.

“Don’t dispute what you don’t know about,” I went on good-naturedly. “I

know nothing about the brokerage business, and you don’t know anything

about saints.”

The practice of religion has come to a point where very few try to make

their spiritual thoughts a matter of experience. I speak to you only about my

experiences; I do not care to lecture on what I know only intellectually.

Most persons become self-satisfied about what they have read of Truth,

without ever having experienced it. In India we do not seek spiritual

guidance from someone just because he has a theological degree, nor do we

seek out those who have only studied the scriptures, without experiencing

their truths. Spiritual victrolas who merely mouth truth do not impress us.

We are taught to recognize the difference between a man’s sermon and his

life; he must demonstrate that he has experienced what he has learned.

Assure Your Ultimate Arrival in Heaven

When you try to experience your spiritual convictions another world begins

to open up to you. Don’t live in a false sense of security, believing that

because you have joined a church you will be saved. You yourself have to

make the effort to know God. Your mind may be satisfied that you are very

religious, but unless your consciousness is satisfied with direct answers to

your prayers, no amount of formal religion can save you. Of what benefit is

praying to God if He does not answer? Difficult though it is to obtain His

response, it can be done. To assure your ultimate arrival in heaven, you

must test the power of your prayers until you have made them effective.

When I was just a little child I made up my mind that when I prayed, my

prayer had to be answered. That kind of determination is the way. Every test

comes then, to break your will, but God’s power to respond is unlimited; the

persistent continuity of your will power will bring His answer.

You should learn to concentrate your thoughts. Therefore it is important to

have time to be alone. Avoid the constant company of other people. Most of

them are like sponges; they draw everything out of you, and you seldom

receive anything in return. It is worthwhile to be with others only if they are

sincere and strong, and if each one is conscious of the other’s sincerity and

strength, so that you exchange noble soul qualities.

Do not while away your time in idleness. A great many people occupy

themselves with inconsequential activities. Ask them what they have been

doing and they will usually say, “Oh, I have been busy every minute!” But

they can scarcely remember what they were so busy about! Too many

diversions, also, weaken your mental powers. If you go every day to the

movies, they will lose their attraction, and you will become bored. Movies

are all basically the same—lovers, heroes, and villains. We may enjoy a

beautiful motion picture story, but life is seldom like that; if on the other

hand it is too realistic, who wants to see more of life as it is, when he goes

to be entertained?

Life is very tricky and we must deal with it as it is. If we do not first master

it ourselves we cannot help anyone else. In the seclusion of concentrated

thought lies hidden the factory of all accomplishment. Remember that. In

this factory continuously weave your will pattern for attaining success over

opposing difficulties. Exercise your will continuously. During the day and

at night you have many opportunities to work in this factory, if you do not

waste your time. At night I withdraw from the world’s demands and am by

myself, an absolute stranger to the world; it is a blank. Alone with my will

power, I turn my thoughts in the desired direction until I have determined in

my mind exactly what I wish to do and how to do it. Then I harness my will

to the right activities and it creates success. In this way I have effectively

used my will power many times. But it won’t work unless the application of

will power is continuous.

It is a wonderful feeling to be able to say, and know, “My will power,

surcharged by the Divine Will, shall accomplish my aim.” If you lazily

leave everything to the Divine Power and neglect to use your God-given

will, results will not be forthcoming. The Divine Power of Its own accord

wants to help you; you don’t have to coax. But you do have to use your will

to demand as His child, and to behave as His child. You must banish the

thought that the Lord with His wonderful power is far away in heaven, and

that you are a helpless little worm buried in difficulties down here on earth.

Remember that behind your will is the great Divine Will; but that oceanic

Power cannot come to your aid unless you are receptive.

Surcharge Your Will Power Through Concentration

The way to become receptive is to sit quietly and concentrate your thoughts

on a worthy wish until your mind and thought become completely dissolved

in that idea. Then will power becomes divine—omniscient and omnipotent

—and can be successfully applied toward realizing your goal. You can’t just

sit there and wait for success to fall into your lap; once your course is set

and your will is firm, you have to make a practical effort. Then you will see

that whatever you require for success starts coming to you. Everything will

push you in the right direction. In your divinely surcharged will power is

the answer to prayer. When you use that will, you open the way through

which your prayers can be answered. This is my experience. I used to

attempt certain things just to test my will power; but I don’t do that

anymore. I know it works.

Once, long ago, I saw that one of my students was going wrong. Foreseeing

the impending tragic results, I brought out every possible reason that might

dissuade him from the course his life was taking; but I saw that no amount

of my will power helped him, because he had made up his mind to follow

the way of evil. “All right,” I told myself finally, “it is ‘good-bye’; let him

go.” But soon my great love and concern for him came to the fore again. I

sat under a banyan tree and began to visualize him. Fervently and

repeatedly I broadcast to him a mental message: “God has told me to

command you to return.” By evening my body and mind were athrill with

the intuition that he was coming.2 At last, there he was at the gate; the

“prodigal son” had come back to the fold. He pranamed3 and said, “All day

long, wherever I went and whatever I did, I beheld your image. What was it

all about?”

“God was calling you through me,” I replied. “It was His call, not mine.

There was no selfish motive in my desire; but I had made up my mind I

wouldn’t stir from this place until you came.” That kind of determination

can change the world. A marvelous power!

So, deep prayer does work. The best time to pray is at night, when there are

fewer distractions. If necessary, sleep a little in the evening so that you are

wide awake when you have your prayers at night, and have it out with God.

At first it will seem hard, but as you keep on trying it will become easier.

You will be surprised at the results. As soon as your will becomes powerful,

God begins to answer. And when the Infinite condescends to break His vow

of silence, you will not be able to contain your joy. But if you have an

egotistic desire to demonstrate to others the power of your prayers, or if you

commercialize it, you will lose that power. God will respond to you no

more; you will have frightened Him away. He comes only when you are

sincere and when you love Him for His own sake. When you are impressed

with yourself and want to show off, He sees that you seek, not Him, but

fame and glorification of your ego, and He will not come.

Who Will Persist Until God Answers?

God is not a mute unfeeling Being. He is love itself. If you know how to

meditate to make contact with Him, He will respond to your loving

demands. You do not have to plead; you can demand as His child. But

which of you will spend the necessary time? Which of you will persist until

you become so concentrated that you receive an answer from Him?

Suppose you have a mortgage on your home and you cannot meet it. Or

there is a certain job you want. In the silence that comes after meditating

deeply, concentrate with unswerving will on the thought of your need. Do

not keep looking for the result. If you sow a seed in the ground and then

take it out every once in a while to see if it is growing, it will never sprout.

Similarly, if every time you pray you look for a sign that the Lord is

granting your wish, nothing will happen. Never try to test God. Just go on

praying unceasingly. Your duty is to bring your need to God’s attention, and

to do your part in helping God to bring that desire to fruition. For example,

in chronic diseases, do your best to help promote healing, but know in your

mind that ultimately God alone can help. Take that thought with you into

meditation every night, and with all your determination pray; suddenly one

day you will find the disease gone.

First, the mind receives the suggestion. Then the Divine impregnates the

mind with His power. Finally the brain releases the life energy to heal. You

do not realize the power of God that is in your mind. It controls all the

bodily functions. You can promote any condition in the body if you exercise

that power of your mind. It is necessary first to learn the right method of

meditation; then you can apply its divinely empowered concentration to

heal the body, or to help you in any other difficulty.

Every day undertake something that is difficult for you, and try to do it.

Though you fail five times, keep on, and as soon as you have succeeded in

that direction, apply your concentrated will on something else. You will

thus be able to accomplish increasingly greater things. Will is the

instrument of the image of God within you. In will lies His limitless power,

the power that controls all the forces of nature. As you are made in His

image, that power is yours to bring about whatever you desire: You can

create prosperity; you can change hatred into love. Pray until body and

mind are completely subjugated; then you will receive God’s response. I

constantly find that my slightest wish is answered.

Your Greatest Necessity Is God

Between the eyebrows is the door to heaven. This center4 in the brain is the

seat of will. When you concentrate deeply there and calmly will, whatever

you are willing shall come about. So never use your will for evil purposes.

To will harm to someone intentionally is a grave misuse of your God-given

power. If you find your will going in the wrong direction, stop! Not only is

it a waste of your divine energy, it will be the cause of your losing that

power; you will not be able to employ it even for good purposes.

Determine honestly whether or not your prayer is legitimate. Do not ask

God for things that are quite impossible in the natural order of life. Ask

only for true necessities. And know the difference between “necessary

necessities” and “unnecessary necessities.” The best way to cure yourself of

desires for “unnecessary necessities” is to reason them away. Dreaming of

big buildings used to be a hobby of mine, but that interest is gone now. I

have plenty of them, and all the headaches that accompany their

maintenance! Ownership is a worrisome responsibility. Cut out desires for

needless possessions. Concentrate only on your real needs.

Your greatest necessity is God. He will give you not only your “necessary

necessities,” but your “unnecessary necessities” as well. He will satisfy

your every desire when you are one with Him. Your wildest dreams will

come true.

When I was a little boy in India I so much wanted a pony, but my mother

wouldn’t allow me to have one. Some years later, after I had started my

school for boys in Ranchi, I brought home a horse for our use. One morning

I found she had given birth to a colt. Just what I had wanted in my

childhood! Many such experiences have come to me. Long ago, while I was

traveling in Kashmir, I saw this building5 in a vision. Years later, when I

came to Los Angeles and saw this place, I recognized it as the building in

my vision, and knew that God intended it to be ours.

Follow the Rules of Prayer

The first rule in prayer is to approach God only with legitimate desires. The

second is to pray for their fulfillment, not as a beggar, but as a son: “I am

Thy child. Thou art my Father. Thou and I are One.” When you pray deeply

and continuously you will feel a great joy welling up in your heart. Don’t be

satisfied until that joy manifests; for when you feel that all-satisfying joy in

your heart, you will know that God has tuned in your prayer broadcast.

Then pray to your Father: “Lord, this is my need. I am willing to work for

it; please guide me and help me to have the right thoughts and to do the

right things to bring about success. I will use my reason, and work with

determination, but guide Thou my reason, will, and activity to the right

thing that I should do.” This is how I have always prayed. Now, as soon as I

ask God about some undertaking, I know whether I should do it or not, and

I know what steps I should and should not take.

Be practical and earnest about prayer. Concentrate deeply on what you are

praying. Before you seek a job, or sign a contract, or do anything important,

think of that Power. Think of it continuously. Take time out of sleep. Your

mind is habituated to resting at night from the day’s duties, and keeps

urging, “Sleep.” You must answer with all your divine power of will:

“Away with sleep! My engagement with God is more important.” Then you

will receive God’s response.

1 Matthew 26:39.

2 Great masters enjoy a divine awareness that permeates the entire body.

For example, their intuitive perception of the wrong thoughts of a disciple

may be felt physically, like sharp pinpricks. Similarly, harmonious, happy

intuitions are sometimes accompanied by a pleasant tingling sensation.

(Publisher’s Note)

3 “Bowed down.” (See pranam in glossary.)

4 The seat of the “single” or spiritual eye; the Kutastha, or Christ

Consciousness center.

5 Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters atop Mount

Washington in Los Angeles. Paramahansaji’s vision of it occurred around

1913.

Making Religion Scientific

First Self-Realization Fellowship Temple at Encinitas,1 California,

December 22, 1940

God is approachable. Talking of Him and listening to His words in the

scriptures, thinking of Him, feeling His presence in meditation, you will see

that gradually the Unreal becomes real, and this world which you think is

real will be seen as unreal. There is no joy like that realization.

The joy of God is boundless, unceasing, all the time new. Body, mind,

nothing can disturb you when you are in that consciousness—such is the

grace and glory of the Lord. And He will explain to you whatever you

haven’t been able to understand; everything you want to know.

There is no use trying to know too much now. How many incarnations

would you have to spend to learn all that is written in the book of nature?

Millions of lives would not be sufficient. So why bother? All things you

will find and understand in God. The masters of India have always said,

“First know Him.” Then, whatever you desire to know, He will reveal to

you. This is His kingdom; this is His knowledge.

As life goes on, its illusions fall away; you see what it is all about. And

when the illusions of childhood and youth are gone, what is there left? Only

in the divine consciousness behind this door [Paramahansaji here touched

his forehead to indicate the location of the Christ center, seat of the spiritual

eye2] can we find pure happiness. I cut the world out of my life because of

its delusive influence, which makes unimportant things seem important. We

are all living in a land of make-believe, trying to “keep up with the

Joneses”; yet it is only by remaining in the consciousness of Spirit that we

can be happy. Try it!

God is eager to bring you to His kingdom, for He craves something too: that

you spontaneously seek Him and cling to Him. Otherwise, He would not

have created the universe and man. His perfection is not conditioned by this

craving; but the one reason behind His creating us is His desire that we love

Him and return to Him. He is looking forward to that time. In our love is

His fulfillment.

The Father has given us freedom to jump into the fire of world illusion or to

return to His home. It is a question of what you would like. Let us all go

Home, that we need not come back into this terrible world. We do not know

under what conditions we will incarnate again. Certainly we do not want to

be reborn in times of suffering and depressions such as we are having now.

These troubles are the result of man’s selfishness and hate. The whole earth

is groaning because God has been forgotten.

Resolve now to go home to your Father. You are fearfully wasting your

time, and you can’t afford to. You don’t know how fortunate you are to

have been born as a human being. In that you are blessed more than any

other creature. The animal is not able to meditate and have God-

communion. You have your freedom to seek Him and you don’t use it. You

sit a little while in meditation and your mind wanders away. But when the

mind prays and prays, and prays again, heaven opens. Then you will be

given all the convincing experiences by which you shall know that God is.

God Is Waiting for Your Invitation

I speak not from book learning, but from perceptions of God. I could not

speak of Him this way if I didn’t see or feel Him; He wouldn’t let me. As I

speak to you I see before me whatever I am talking about; many times I

don’t even see you. I wouldn’t tell you anything at all if I didn’t know Him.

But I am here to tell you that the very joy you are seeking in sex, money,

wine, love, fame—that joy is within yourself. You don’t have to go

elsewhere. You don’t have to beg or flatter God; but you have to ask. You

have to pray to Him sincerely and lovingly, “Come to me.”

You are not determined enough. As the miser loves money, as the lover

loves the beloved, so should you love God; then you will find Him, without

fail. It is difficult, but if at night you sit long in meditation you won’t know

time. Even when I don’t get any sleep, I never miss it. When God comes,

where is sleep? where is the body? Nothing matters but His intoxicating

presence. You read in novels of ideal love, but it is nothing compared to the

love of God. Hasten to Him. To be ever conscious of Him is the most

wonderful existence. As I am talking to you, again and again the whole

world melts away and I feel only His Bliss.

Creation Is Meant to Disillusion You

Science devises methods for your physical comfort, stimulating and

catering to endless desires. But after a while creature comforts become

burdens, pleasures no longer, because you find it is hard work to take care

of them. Thus you “pay” for everything you get except divine blessedness.

For that you have only to sit still and ask your Heavenly Father. If I thought

I had to earn God I wouldn’t try; as a son I have a right to know Him. If you

ask your right from the Father, He will give it to you. To those devotees

who urge, He comes. That is what He wants. His whole creation is intended

to disillusion you, and thus cause you to draw back to Him. You don’t know

when you will be taken away from this earth; there is no law that you will

enjoy a long life. This proves how foolish it is to waste time. I live from

minute to minute, day to day. I know only the joy of living; inside, complete

resignation to Him.

A time will come when everything will be made or accomplished by will.

Whatever you wish you will see done. This I have demonstrated again and

again in my life. Development of the heavenly power of will for its divinely

intended use—to know God—is the only purpose in human life. He has

created each one of you, and He is throbbing in you, crying to enter your

consciousness so that He may release you. I am sure He feels guilty for

having created us! Every day I ask Him why He did it. (I talk to Him about

anything that comes to my mind. He likes it, that I am “after” Him; He

knows His creation is anything but perfect.) The Lord replies that you

cannot make steel until you have made the iron white-hot in fire. It is not

meant for harm. Trouble and disease have a lesson for us. Our painful

experiences are not meant to destroy us, but to burn out our dross, to hurry

us back Home. No one is more anxious for our release than God.

It is His voice that is speaking through me. If only one person responds and

finds his freedom in Spirit, my task is done. The salvation of one life is

worth more than the conversion of thousands. I tell you of one Master of

this universe—one Beloved who is waiting for you, crying for you. You

don’t know how He rejoices when a soul enters His kingdom! He gathers

all the angels together and they celebrate that soul’s entrance into heaven.

What joy there is!

For good reason you are not allowed to remember your past incarnations.

Suppose you have been born ten times. You have therefore had ten mothers.

How can you love them all the same? You are meant to learn that behind

those ten mothers there is One Mother; behind all friends, One Friend;

behind all fathers, One Father; behind all loves, One Love. How wonderful

is that recognition! It is as if you had been playing hide-and-seek in the

corridors of incarnations, and then you find Him! When I realized that One

Love, I could not contain myself. My mind vanished into the Infinite

Kingdom. It is so, even now. The joy of Spirit is endless.

Seek a Definite Understanding of Truth

In the physical sciences everything is systematized into definite

conceptions: combine two particular substances, or two substances in a

particular way, for a certain result. The great masters of Self-Realization

Fellowship are telling you why you should seek God scientifically, and the

scientific way to get to Him. Every effort you make to follow these

instructions will bring to you a definite understanding. Some read a little

about the spiritual laws, and then put the book aside. That is not the way to

Self-knowledge. You must make these truths a practical part of your life.

Most people don’t take religion seriously. They keep it in the realm of

imagination and fancy. In India we are taught the practical use of religion.

We don’t say, “Well, I shall find out all about God in the hereafter.” We

want to know God now.

Science and religion should go hand in hand. All the results of scientific

investigation are definite and are connected by reason, whereas religion is

often dogmatic. When Jesus urged his disciples to have faith, he didn’t

mean blind belief. It breaks my heart when I see blind dogmatism, for it is

one reason why the majority of people have no real interest in God.

Although there are nevertheless many who are interested in God, real

seekers are few, because hardly anyone tries to understand his way out of

this dream drama. Few of His children appreciate the gifts of the Heavenly

Father, and of those who do, fewer still try deeply or scientifically enough

to know Him. Those who want to seek Him earnestly should learn how to

do so scientifically.

By Yoga, Religion Can Be Made Scientific

Yoga is definite and scientific. Yoga means union of soul and God, through

step-by-step methods with specific and known results. It raises the practice

of religion above the differences of dogma. My guru, Sri Yukteswar,

extolled Yoga; he did not, however, indicate that realization of God thereby

would be immediate. “You have to work hard for it,” he told me. I did, and

when the promised results came, I saw that Yoga was marvelous.3

Those who do not give time to their religion cannot expect to know all at

once about God and the hereafter. Usually people don’t make the effort, or

if they do, the effort is not deep and sincere enough. Nighttime should be

spent with God. You sleep more than necessary, and thus waste many

valuable hours. Night was meant to screen all the attractions of the world,

that you might the more intently explore the kingdom of God. He created

darkness to obscure material objects, for He wants you to forget the world

at night and seek Him. Read the scriptures, read the Lessons,4 and meditate

—the glory and the joy it brings! Nothing else can give you that experience.

See if it isn’t true.

Remember, if you don’t find God, you are not making enough effort in your

meditation. Should you not find the pearl after one or two divings, don’t

blame the ocean. Blame your diving; you are not going deep enough. If you

dive really deep you will find the pearl of His presence. Unless we apply

definite methods of science in practicing religion, it becomes little more

than a salve for our conscience. “Oh yes, I go to church every Sunday,”

people say; but they don’t know why they go. And once they have said

“Amen” after the sermon, they forget all about church until the next

Sunday. Isn’t that foolish? If you do not commune with God there, why

should you go?

The saints say that if you coax God earnestly enough, you can see Him. But

you have to do it all yourself. It is good to meditate with a few others, but

make the supreme effort alone at night, not just in church on Sundays. Get

away from everyone. It is good for your health, your nerves, and your

longevity not to mix too much with people. Most of them are thinking only

of what you can give them. Hardly anyone thinks of your highest welfare

except your spiritual teacher and God. The wise teacher will give you but

one instruction: think of God.

And share Him; there is no form of service greater than to speak of God. If

you convince someone that the path of error leads to the valley of death,

and that the path of meditation leads to everlasting life, you have given him

something of more value than a million dollars. Money is perishable, but

realization of God will go with us beyond the portals of the grave.

Therefore whenever I see anyone striving and struggling with great

intensity to know God, it gives me great joy.

Although I am planning and doing things in the world, it is only to please

the Lord. I test myself: even when I am working I whisper within, “Where

are You, Lord?” and the whole world changes. There is nothing but a great

Light, and I am a little bubble in that Ocean of Light. Such is the joy of

existence in God.

The experiences I have told you about are scientifically attainable. If you

follow the spiritual laws, the result is certain. If the result doesn’t come,

find fault with your effort. Intensity in all your religious practices is the

only way. Those who don’t meditate regularly and deeply are restless

whenever they do meditate, and give up after a short effort. But if you make

a greater effort day by day, the ability to go deep will come. I don’t have to

make any effort now; the whole world is gone instantly when I close my

eyes and gaze into the Christ center. And I used to sit for hours trying to

forget the body and the thoughts! I came to a point where I thought it was

no use. But I saw it was my fault. Between the restless thoughts and God

there is a wall; the ordinary person doesn’t try, so he never gets over that

wall. But the spiritual fighter goes on. When the mind becomes still, you

are in the kingdom of the Infinite. Those who have spent too much time on

foolish things remain fruitlessly knocking outside.

Communion with God is the only thing to live for. You will have to come to

that understanding eventually, often after much suffering. Why not learn

now? He is ready to welcome you. You can’t fail to reach God ultimately. It

is foolish to ask, “Will I be able to get into the kingdom of heaven?” There

is no other place you can stay, for that is your real home. You don’t have to

earn it. You are already God’s child, made in His image. You have only to

tear away the mask of the human being and realize your divine birthright.

Satan Makes Us Think God Is Unattainable

So never say that you won’t be able to get into the kingdom of heaven.

Satan drops that delusive thought in your mind to keep you here. You are

not a mortal being. When I heard that from my Guru I was overjoyed.

Thereafter I refused to consider myself a sinner. Nor should you call

yourself a sinner; it is a desecration of the image of God within you. Nor

should you let anyone else call you a sinner. What does it matter, what you

were yesterday? You are a child of God, now and evermore. Who can keep

you away from the kingdom of God? That is how you should feel. But you

must scientifically pursue Him. The science of religion is to make the effort

in meditation until God becomes real to you, until you know that He alone

is real. I used to go to the crematory grounds and pray to see through the

delusion of the world; I cried in the woods, I closeted myself in the attic,

praying unceasingly until that realization came. I beheld burning worlds

steaming and fuming around the feet of my Divine Mother.5 In the light of

Her wisdom all my mortality was consumed.

Meditation Is the True Practice of Religion

The true practice of religion is to sit still in meditation and talk to God. But

you don’t get to that point of intensity, you don’t concentrate enough, and

that is why you remain in delusion. To teach the value of long, intense

concentration on God, I instituted an all-day Christmas meditation just

before Christmas each year.6 At first the devotees feel only how long it is,

but as they go deep they become oblivious of time. Most churchgoers can’t

sit still for an hour unless there is something going on all the while to divert

their minds.

To be in the consciousness of God is entirely different; it comes when you

sit quietly and say: “One by one I close the doors of the senses, lest the

aroma of the rose or the song of the nightingale distract my love from

Thee.”7 And as you go on saying that with deeper and deeper concentration

and devotion, you will see after a little while that you have forgotten all

distractions; before your inward gaze a light appears, or saints appear, or

you are engulfed in a deep peace or divine joy.

Any spiritual activity does good by keeping the thought of God alive, but

what is ultimately necessary is this intensity of effort to know Him. There

should be centers of meditation all over the world, where devotees come

together to commune with God. When I come to the temple it is for one

purpose: to be with God and to tell you of God. And you come here for my

words and to try by meditation to feel His presence.

One moon dispels the darkness of the heavens. So is one soul who is trained

to know God, a soul in whom there is true devotion and sincere seeking and

intensity; and wherever he will go he will dispel the spiritual darkness of

others. Those who are even thinking of God shine a little, but they are not

able to give light to the world. Ordinary religious people are like stars,

giving only a tiny light.

Meditation Provides the Proof of God’s Existence

By scientific meditation become a true devotee, that like the moon you

dispel the darkness around yourself and others. Without realization through

meditation, religion is the most mysterious book of all; you will never be

able to understand it. But by meditation you have the proof of God’s

existence.

Go to your room and shut the door—make no fuss. Sit down and talk to

God. Practice meditation. Let your mind become so intense that the next

time you sit to meditate you won’t have to make the effort; your mind will

be fixed immediately on Him. If you don’t make a great effort to conquer

physical and mental restlessness in the beginning, you will have difficulty

every time you meditate throughout the years. But if you make that supreme

effort at the start, you will soon be happy and free.

When I utter the name “God” my whole being melts away in His Joy. But

that I had to work for. Make the effort. I was not at first the devotional kind.

My mind used to be very restless. But now it is just like fire. As soon as I

put my mind at the Christ center, all thoughts are gone—breath, heart, and

mind are instantly still and I am aware only of Spirit.

Make religion real by scientific methods. Science gives you definiteness

and certainty. Sit quietly and practice the methods that have been given by

great yogis of India: Mahavatar Babaji, Lahiri Mahasaya, Swami Sri

Yukteswar.8 Find in yourself that supreme blessedness of which I speak to

you, and when you do you will see that religion is no longer a myth but a

scientific certainty. Pray to Him, “Lord, You are the Master of creation, so I

come to You. I will never give up until You talk to me and make me realize

Your presence. I will not live without You.”

Intensity, Secrecy, Devotion, and Constancy Are Necessary

The great Indian saint Sri Ramakrishna was worshiping a stone image of

Kali, the Cosmic Mother, and praying for Her to appear to him in reality.

His spiritual anguish became so intense that he felt life was no longer worth

living. At this moment his eyes fell on a sword that was kept in the temple,

and like a madman he seized it, with the intention of ending his life. In that

moment the Mother revealed Herself in Her cosmic form. Her devotee was

engulfed in an oceanic Bliss. In the very place where the saint had this

experience, that same stone statue of the Divine Mother assumed a living

form and spoke to me.9

If I hadn’t spent hours seeking God in meditation I would not have known

that religion is a science. Intensity, secrecy, devotion, and constancy are

necessary. You don’t know when death will come. Every minute keep your

mind on God. Everything you want and need is right within you; seek long

and seek deeply. I meditate for hours; I see no one until I am finished. You

must make up your mind that you are not going to be bothered by anyone or

anything. Then you won’t know time.

In my Yogoda school in Ranchi,10 India, I used to spend all my spare time

roaming around the grounds, here and there sitting awhile to meditate, until

my mind was drunk with God. That is the only way to find Him. Don’t

waste your time. When you are able to live in the divine consciousness, four

to six hours of sleep are plenty; you will never feel tired, you will never

miss sleep. Sleep is under my control; it is the same with eating. I have

something infinitely greater, and God has proven that when He is with me

all the “necessities of life” become unnecessary. In that consciousness you

become more healthy than the average person, more joyous, more bountiful

in every way. Don’t seek little things; they will divert you from God. Start
your experiment now: make life simple and be a king.
1 The first temple on the grounds of the Self-Realization Fellowship
Hermitage in Encinitas was built in 1938 on a bluff overlooking the Pacific
Ocean. It was called the Golden Lotus Temple. Gradual erosion of the
shoreline ultimately caused the structure to slip into the sea.
2 The spiritual eye is the pranic star door through which man must enter to
attain superconsciousness, Christ Consciousness, and Cosmic
Consciousness. “I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be
saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture” (John 10:9).
3 “[O Arjuna,] I have this day informed thee about that same ancient yoga,
for thou art My devotee and friend. This sacred mystery (of yoga) is,
indeed, the producer of supreme benefit (to mankind)” (Bhagavad Gita
IV:3).
4 Scientific principles of yoga meditation are taught in the Self-Realization
Fellowship Lessons, available from the SRF International Headquarters in
Los Angeles.
5 “That aspect of the Uncreated Infinite which is active in creation is
referred to in Hindu scriptures as the Divine Mother. The Lord in the form
of the Cosmic Mother appears in living tangibility before true bhaktas
(devotees of a Personal God).”—Paramahansa Yogananda
6 A spiritual custom begun by Paramahansaji in 1931 and carried on by
Self-Realizationists in their ashrams, temples, and centers throughout the
world. Daylong meditations are also held at other times during the year, on
days of special spiritual significance. (Publisher’s Note)
7 From “Prayer at Night” in Paramahansa Yogananda’s Whispers from
Eternity.
8 Including Paramahansa Yogananda, these are the Self-Realization
Fellowship line of Gurus. See Gurus in glossary. (Publisher’s Note)

9 The experience is related in Autobiography of a Yogi, “The Heart of a

Stone Image.”

10 See Ranchi school in glossary.

Understanding the Unreality of Matter

Circa 1926

The Hindu scriptures point out that belief in the nonexistence of matter and

the allness of Spirit should not be founded on dogmatic, illogical,

unintelligible, or inexplicable theories, but on scientific inner investigation

and exact understanding.

People generally identify themselves with the body, which is supported by

food; but they fail to realize that the basic source of bodily existence is

prana (life energy).1 No food or other outer aid can revive a man from

whom the cosmic current has withdrawn.

The link between man’s material body and his immaterial mind is prana.

The ancient Hindu sages discovered the existence of prana and formulated

the science of pranayama,2 life-energy control.

Lord Jesus fasted in the wilderness for forty days. He said: “Man shall not

live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of

God.”3

The “word” is cosmic vibration; the “mouth of God” is the medulla

oblongata in the posterior part of the brain, tapering off into the spinal cord.

This, the most vital spot in the human body, is the divine entrance (“mouth

of God”) for the “word” or Aum,4 the cosmic vibratory energy by which

man is sustained.

People who never fast do not know from experience that man can live, as

Christ did for forty days, solely by the “word” of God.

In the early stages of a week’s fasting, hunger is present; but as the days go

by, less hunger and a sense of freedom are distinctly felt. Why? Because

denial of gross food to the body compels it to depend on immaterial food:

the life current.

Man’s will power is the great generator of energy. Through will power and

willingness one is able to draw quickly on the infinite store of inner

strength. A person who is unwilling to perform his daily tasks experiences a

lack of energy. A man who works hard but with willingness is borne up

physically and mentally by the cosmic current.

One who learns and practices the metaphysical methods of living by will

power and by consciously tapping the inexhaustible source of life energy is

freed from many limitations of the body.

The Hindu sages and yogis say that matter is materialized mind-stuff; and

some of them, like Jesus, have proved this truth by demonstrating the power

to materialize and dematerialize their bodies and other physical objects.

The Chemical Elements of Matter Are Electronic Vibrations

Modern science shows that matter is composed of vibratory forces. The

chemical elements, the structural factors responsible for all forms in the

universe—from stones and stars to man—are nothing more than different

forms of electronic vibrations. For example, in ice we find coldness, weight,

form; it is visible. Melt the ice; it becomes water. Pass electricity through it;

it becomes invisible hydrogen and oxygen, which, analyzed further, are

forms of electronic vibrations. One may therefore say scientifically that ice

does not exist, even though it is perceptible to our senses of sight, touch,

and so on. In reality its essence is invisible electrons or forms of energy.

In other words, that which can be dissolved into invisibility cannot be said

to have a valid existence. In this sense, matter can be considered as not

existing; but matter does have relative existence. Matter exists in relation to

our mind and as an expression of invisible electronic forces that do exist,

being unchangeable and immortal.

Both water and ice are manifestations of invisible gases and have only

formal, transitory existence. Similarly, both mortal mind and matter are

fleeting manifestations of Divine Consciousness, and possess merely formal

existence; in reality only Cosmic Mind exists.

Just as a child is born through the instrumentality of parents, so matter is

dependent on mind for its existence. Matter is born from Divine Mind and

is perceptible to mortal mind; in itself and of itself, matter has no reality, no

intrinsic existence.

The blind or nonintellectual electronic forces of creation are nevertheless

creative teleological agents because they contain within themselves the

vibrations of the universal, conscious-of-itself life force or prana, which in

turn issued from the fiat of Divinity.

“God said, Let there be light: and there was light,”5 that is, the projection of

Divine Thought and Will became light or vibratory energy, the flowing

forth of life current and electrons, which further vibrated more strongly and

became the diverse subtle or unseen forces of nature, which in turn

externalized themselves as the ninety-two principal elements of matter that

constitute the universe.

To human consciousness, matter is both perceptible and real. But man had

discovered through theoretical investigation, through logic, and through

certain laboratory experiments (such as converting a visible piece of ice into

invisible forces) that a permanent and unalterable creative power must

underlie all the transitory and illusive forms of the phenomenal world.

This truth may be grasped just as we grasp the fact that the ocean exists

though its waves have no permanent existence, being just passing, formal

manifestations of one great substance. Waves cannot exist without the

ocean, but the ocean exists with or without waves.

These concepts can be intellectually understood but cannot be known until

one has learned the method of converting matter into life force, and life

force into Cosmic Consciousness,6 as Christ, Krishna, and other Self-

realized masters were able to do. To such enlightened ones, matter per se

does not exist, because they see that beneath the slight rippling waves of

creation is the changeless Ocean of Spirit.

The Universe Is God’s Dream

In the Vedanta7 and Yoga philosophies the universe is spoken of as God’s

dream. Matter and mind—the cosmos with its stars and planets; the gross

surface waves and the subtle undercurrents of the material creation; the

human powers of feeling, will, and consciousness; and the states of life and

death, day and night, health and disease, success and failure—are realities

according to the law of relativity governing this dream of God’s.

All the dualities perceived by the law of relativity are real to the dreamer,

the mortal man who plays his little part in the great cosmic dream. To

escape from maya, illusion, the law of relativity, one must awaken from the

dream into eternal God-wakefulness. We cannot change the lawful dream

by imagination or by denying its existence, or by accepting “life” but

rejecting “death,” or by recognizing health but ignoring sickness. One state

is as much a part of its opposite state as are the two sides of a fabric. The

dualities are inherently and essentially one. The truth seeker does not try to

separate them in his mind, but to rise above them by wisdom.

The man who considers his body to be different from his mind, and who

wants to accept as “real” only the positive, happy, and beneficial aspects of

a universe unalterably dual in its nature, is a man deeply asleep in the

delusions of the dream world.

Just as a person has dreams that seem real for a time but lose their validity

when he emerges into the waking state of consciousness, so it is possible for

man to awaken from the dream of matter-reality and to live in the

changeless realm of Spirit.

Only the superman, who has learned to expand and transfer his

consciousness to the Infinite, can realize creation as a dream of God’s; he

alone can say with true knowledge that matter has no existence. By means

of a long series of self-disciplinary steps—through following the scientific

yoga path or any other way of spiritual perfection, whether that of love,

wisdom, service, or self-effacement—the God-seeker dissolves the dualities

and discerns the Eternal Oneness. “Whosoever, freed from delusion, knows

Me thus as the Supreme Spirit, knows all. He worships Me with his whole

being.”8

1 “Lifetrons,” the finer-than-atomic energies that sustain life in all things in
the universe. There are two kinds of prana: cosmic energy, the omnipresent
source of life and vitality permeating and surrounding all living things; and
the specific prana or energy pervading each human body.
2 Through pranayama the adept is able to control the life energy in the
sensory and motor nerves, and thus free his mind from body consciousness
during meditation. He is able also to use this life energy to heal or vitalize
his body at will.
3 Matthew 4:4.
4 Gross matter emanates from and is sustained by the intelligent cosmic
vibration of God, the subtle building material of the universe. The primal
properties of this vibration are light and sound. Aum is the sound of God’s
creative vibration, referred to in Christian scriptures as the Amen, the Holy
Ghost, and the Word. (See Aum in glossary.)
5 Genesis 1:3.
6 The essence of Spirit. (See Cosmic Consciousness in glossary.)
7 Literally, “end of the Vedas.” Vedanta is the philosophy presented in the
latter portion of the Vedas. This philosophy declares that God is the only
reality and that creation is essentially an illusion. Man’s duty therefore is to
transcend the illusion by realization of God.
8 Bhagavad Gita XV:19.

Man’s Greatest Adventure

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, February 29, 1940

Life is the greatest adventure imaginable. Although some lives are without

much interest and excitement, others are full of extraordinary experiences. I

heard of a man who tried thirty-two times to commit suicide, and something

happened every time to prevent him. Imagine what it would be like to know

all about the lives of all the people who are now on earth, and those who are

gone, and those who are yet to come! Such is God’s power. Jesus said, “Are

not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the

ground without [the knowledge of] your Father.”1 The lifetimes of

experiences of all men are in God’s memory. It is difficult indeed to

conceive of a consciousness that is aware of everything that has ever

happened. Yet to fathom the nature of Spirit is the greatest adventure in this

universe. I will give you a picture of it as it is coming to me at this moment

before my spiritual eye.2

Truths are more than imagination; they are real. Yet their origin is a thought

in the mind of God. All of the different forms of atomic matter, for

example, are but materialized thoughts of God—they can be reconverted

into thoughts, and the thoughts can again be materialized into objects. Man

also has the power to conceive ideas, but his imagination is not very strong.

If his imagination became powerful enough, man could create material

objects on earth.3 He has latent within him the same creative power by

which God, even as He thought, materialized His mental creations in the

world. But it has become next to impossible for man to materialize his

thoughts because he has not utilized the free power, the divine power of

thought, bestowed on him by God.

When we try to imagine the consciousness of God we wonder how He can

remember all things, because we judge everything by the standard of our

own mental capacity. We understand according to our own experience. A

person whose memory is not strong tends to assume that everyone else’s

memory is the same way. Yet there are persons of exceptional memory who

can recall a whole book, perhaps, just as easily as you can remember a few

lines. Those who are forgetful find it difficult to realize that others can have

an unfailing power of recollection.

A jeweler remembers his jewels, a bookkeeper the figures in his books; so

God is able to remember everything that He has created in this universe.

Being gifted with almighty power, He has instant recall of everything that

has ever happened. God does not need a limited physical brain to remember

what has passed. His limitless consciousness is all-knowing.

The Origin and Power of Memory

Memory is a wondrous power. All human memory comes from God’s

tremendous memory. For example, you cannot tell me about all the motion

pictures you have seen since birth, but if I were to show you one of those

films again, you would instantly recall it. The divine underlying memory is

right there within you, ever recognizing experiences that have passed. As

soon as you see the opening scene again, the whole story comes back to

you. “Oh, I saw this picture before,” you say. “I remember how it ended.”

How is it that we can recognize a picture—every detail of it—that we have

seen years ago? Because all happenings are recorded in the brain. As soon

as you put the needle of attention on a certain record of experience, your

memory begins to play back that experience. If I ask where you were sitting

when we were here together last Thursday, you recall it and begin to

remember other things as well. If I ask, “What did I say?” my words start

coming back to you.

The inner power of memory comes from God and is perfect. It never

forgets. The ordinary man’s memory cannot hold the consciousness of all

experiences at one time, but the underlying divine memory retains

everything simultaneously and permanently. Therefore good or poor

memory is a matter of conviction. You have convinced yourself that you

have a weak memory and so you have a weak memory. However, it is not

easy to jump from this belief to the opposite. Much effort is required to

convince yourself that your memory is in actuality a manifestation of the

all-recalling divine memory of God.

The greatest human memory is naught but a borrowing from the unlimited

consciousness of God, in which are recorded all the adventures of all human

beings and other life-forms.

Creation—Dual Adventure of God and Man

The story of God’s creation is marvelous—how He projected into existence

all beings on this earth, and how He is working behind the scenes to bring

us back to our real existence in Him. It is almost impossible to describe in

human language the cosmic adventure of God’s creation and its subtle

intertwining with the individual life-adventures of countless human beings.

We find that human beings live on the average sixty years, the crocodile

from sixty to a hundred. The redwood tree lives for two thousand years, the

dog only about fourteen, and the horse at most about thirty-six years. It is

evident that Someone has fixed these various life-spans. Yet we hear of

some great yogis who have lived for hundreds of years.4 I know definitely

that Mahavatar Babaji5 has lived for centuries and is still in his body in

perfect youth. Trailanga Swami6 is said to have lived for more than three

hundred years. Truth is more fascinating than fiction.

It is possible to imagine that under favorable conditions (and if there is no

waste of vital essence,7 and there is proper food and right thinking) the

human body could go on indefinitely. But the pressures on the body are

terrific. When a mouse is caught in a trap, its heart beats many times faster

than it does normally, and when you are unable to pay your bills, your heart

does the same! Thus worry takes its toll. And there are other kinds of stress.

I am told that the Police Commissioner of Chicago has demonstrated with

instruments the possibility that if noise were taken away from the cities,

their residents would live ten years longer.

We are living in a wonderful world nevertheless. Those who exist only to

“eat, drink, and be merry,” and to sleep, have no idea of the wonders of

human life.

The adventure begins with the struggle the soul goes through to enter a

womb at the time of conception. In the astral world8 there are millions of

souls struggling to return to earth, to enter the mated sperm and ovum cells

at the time of conception. Saint or sinner, unless you have attained final

redemption there is a great desire to reincarnate again on earth. At the time

of conception there is a flash in the ether and one soul enters as the sperm

and ovum cells unite. You had to fight to get into the womb. Not only you

but many souls rushed to enter, and the ones that won are you, and you, and

I. It was not an easy victory.

Prenatal Consciousness

After you have entered the womb you ask, “What have I done? I have been

free from the confining mortal body for so long, gliding along in a

weightless body of light, and now I am caught again in a physical form.”

Nevertheless, you become accustomed to these new conditions during the

nine months in the womb. That is the punishment. It is nine months of

living in a dungeon in which you have to breathe through someone else, eat

through someone else, receive your blood, and the power for its circulation,

through someone else. You are dependent. Your soul cries to the Lord, “Let

me out of this prison! I can’t see, I can’t hear, I am bound.”

If there is a hades or purgatory it is those nine months in the mother’s body

—helpless, in darkness, bound to one spot like a tree, with only occasional

memories of the past coming in, and then lapses into sleep. It is when

memories of the past life come that you struggle in the mother’s body. I

have transported my consciousness into these prenatal states and I know

what I am saying.9 The baby’s sleep and wakefulness in the mother’s body

do not depend on her sleeping and waking. The child’s will to move is a

memory coming from the soul’s past. So he stirs restlessly in the mother’s

body until he tires and goes to sleep. Then he wakes up for a while and

moves again. He feels hunger, and, through the nourishment in the mother’s

blood, the satisfaction of his hunger.

The infant slightly hears the vibrations of the mother’s heartbeat and

circulation; by these sounds he is made conscious of his body and he wants

to be free. Thus the soul’s first adventure is the fight between two ideas: the

wish to return to earth in a human form, and the desire to feel the freedom

of having no form.

The soul’s human encasement starts out as a fishlike form with a tiny tail.

That form grows into an animal form, curled up in the womb. There comes

an occasional memory of the past life, and the embryo stirs. The struggle

becomes greater as the embryo begins to grow into a human form in the

mother’s body. The soul cries, “Let me out!” When the will becomes very

strong, the baby is born. Premature babies are souls who are very stubborn-

willed. They don’t want to remain nine months in the mother’s body, and so

they come early.

The Breath of Life

The infant arrives in this world crying; because, the saints say, the soul

remembers its previous incarnations and does not like the thought of

coming back to earth again to go through the struggle of life here. Related

also to this memory is the attitude of supplication in which a baby usually

holds its hands before it comes into the world. It is praying to God, “Please

don’t give me physical birth again.”

The physiological explanation of the baby’s crying is that the lungs must be

opened up in order to start the breathing process, and the baby’s first cry is

an effort to activate the lungs and start the breath of life. When the baby is

born, the breath goes in, and the soul that was semi-dormant becomes a

living being with an independent life. “God breathed into his nostrils the

breath of life; and man became a living soul.”10 Many persons mistakenly

believe that the soul enters the body at birth, but if the soul were not already

there, the body would not have developed from the original tiny cells.

Should the soul leave the embryo before birth, the infant will be born dead.

Man’s body is made of sixteen basic material elements supported and

activated by nineteen elements11 of subtle energy. These can be condensed

into pure consciousness. “Man became a living soul” refers to the fact that

the ordinary man’s physical body, which is made of chemicals (“the dust of

the ground”), must breathe oxygen in order to be sustained on earth, as

ordained by God when He first “breathed into his nostrils the breath of

life.”

When the baby is born, he blinks at the light, he hears sounds, he smells and

tastes, and he breathes. He sees that conditions seem to be normal—he has a

physical body again. His prenatal resistance to birth ends with his first

breath, when maya (the cosmic delusion that “existence” depends on body

and breath) comes over him. He feels once more attracted to the physical

world.

As time goes on the baby struggles for control over his body. How often

you see him repeatedly thrusting his hands and feet up in the air in an

attempt at coordination! All these actions are directed by the subconscious

mind through the soul’s memory of the past. That memory is always there.

You instinctively fear death because you remember the many times you

have been through that experience. You are also afraid of pain because you

have suffered many times before.

When the baby grows into a little child he is surrounded by the influences

of the mother’s and father’s guiding will, and the wills of other relatives as

well. Each one wants him to be something different, and his naughty friends

want him to be still something else!

The child has a great many struggles with these conflicting pressures. This

is a miserable life, so it is good to give your children a little freedom. Young

ones who are given too much freedom, however, may later lament, “I wish I

had been told long ago not to do this; then I would not be what I am today.”

Think of all the struggles, physiological and mental, one has to go through

until he becomes a youth. At that time of life the senses become more active

and the youth has a great inner battle with himself. The struggle with the

senses is a tremendous contest. To conquer in this adventure of youth, to go

victoriously through this thrill of living, is a great experience.

Man Should Befriend Himself

It is wonderful to be alive, but there are many agents waiting to kill us. An

adventure with wild animals in South Africa is nothing compared to the

adventure of life itself. No other tale in history is as interesting. Man with

his intelligence knows how to protect himself against animals, but he

doesn’t know how to protect himself against his own bad habits and evil

ways. The greatest of all enemies of man is himself. More than personal or

national enemies, more than germs, bombs, or any other threat, man should

fear himself when he is wrong. To remain in ignorance of your divine

nature and to be overpowered by bad habits is to make an enemy of your

own self. The best way to be successful in this adventure of life is to be

your own friend. Krishna said: “The Self is the friend of the (transformed)

self, but the enemy of the unregenerate self.”12

The Subtle Enemies

It is easy to picture ourselves starting off to explore some wild and

unknown country. If we are going by ship we want a lifeboat with us;

should the steamer sink, we know we can get into the boat and save

ourselves. But in so many of life’s experiences there seems to be a leak in

our lifeboat, no matter what precautions we have taken.

In a jungle infested with animals you can take reasonable care against them,

but subtle dangers are more difficult to overcome. How to protect oneself

against a barrage of germs? Millions are floating around us all the time. We

think we are safe when we take precautions against dangers we can see and

hear, but we have only inadequate means to protect ourselves against germs.

In your own bloodstream the white corpuscles are constantly fighting these

organisms. Drugs only numb them; the white corpuscles are the soldiers

who move in and destroy them. If your blood is weak, the soldiers will not

be able to help you. In the lungs of many unsuspecting persons lurk fierce

tuberculosis bacilli, ready to destroy their host. Nature forms a restraining

wall of cells around them, but it is effective only so long as the body can

keep up its resistance. This struggle of life goes on constantly in the unseen

jungle of life within! If you could examine your food under a microscope

you would not eat it. Germs are having a feast thereon, and you are

swallowing them whole. The water you drink is alive with such organisms.

There is no true vegetarian because everyone eats millions of germs each

day. Shall man then stop eating?

Prepare for Every Kind of Battle

In order to go safely through this jungle of life you must equip yourself

with the proper weapons. You have to be a well-trained soldier. The layman

who doesn’t know how to protect himself is soon killed. The wise man who

is armed against all forms of warfare—against disease, against destiny and

karma, against all evil thoughts and habits—becomes the victor in this

adventure. It requires carefulness and, in addition, the adoption of certain

methods by which we can overcome our enemies.

As we progress we learn better methods of vanquishing the causes of our

physical, mental, moral, and spiritual disasters. When you have gone

successfully through physical illnesses and accidents and inner struggles,

then you can say that life was a sweet adventure. Jesus could say this. But

before you have similarly conquered, it is premature to say that life is

sweet. Until you have attained final ascension, liberation of the soul in God,

life is not yet finished for you. You have not overcome the desire to be

adventurous until you have ascended consciously in Spirit.

Seeing someone who is suffering, you feel thankful that you are not going

through that particular adventure. But you may be next. The possibilities of

harm to the body are numerous. So be equipped. The scientist says, “Eat

nourishing food and follow health laws to protect yourself from germs.”

The politician says, “Be good soldiers to protect yourselves from outside

enemies.” We are living in strange times. Even women, the proverbial

saviors of the world, are being trained as soldiers to kill others’ children.

Horrible! But once in a while some good comes from war—it removes

cowardice from us.

The Importance of Mind Power

In this jungle of life, surrounded by enemies—disease, poverty, suffering,

bad habits, and wrong desires—there are so many rules to be observed that

life becomes intolerable when you try to keep them all in mind. You tire of

them because each department of life is limitless in its potential for

diversity. When you attempt to apply health rules you are nearly

overwhelmed—there is no time to think about anything else! And everyone

has a different set of health precepts for you to follow. We are under a great

hypnosis. As I tried different methods, this truth dawned on me: mind

controls the effectiveness of them all.

God has given us one tremendous instrument of protection—more powerful

than machine guns, electricity, poison gas, or any medicine—the mind. It is

the mind that must be strengthened. As for the body, I will do only the will

of God. If He tells me to go to a doctor, it is all right, and if He tells me to

suffer, it is all right. Whatever is His will is my will. An important part of

the adventure of life is to get hold of the mind, and to keep that controlled

mind constantly attuned to the Lord. This is the secret of a happy,

successful existence.

The Ultimate Protection Is God-Communion

Even though you adopt physical methods of healing, do not put all your

faith in the methods, but in the power of God behind them. If you have cut

your finger, put iodine on it, but inwardly pray: “Lord, help me not to be

dependent on medicine, but to rely on mind power alone.” You have not

been taught how to attain that mental state. It comes by exercising mind

power and by attuning the mind to God through meditation. In this way you

should gain complete power over the mind before you try to deny matter

and material remedies. Until then it is best to take commonsense steps to

help the body. When you can drink poison and remain unaffected by it, you

can rightfully deny matter and say mind is everything. You must arrive at

that consciousness first.

God offers you an invincible weapon by which you can eradicate all your

sorrows and suffering: wisdom, which comes through God-communion.

The easiest way to overcome disease, disappointments, and disasters is to

be in constant attunement with God.

We are babes in the woods of life, forced to learn by our own experiences

and troubles, stumbling into pitfalls of sickness and wrong habits. Again

and again we have to raise our voices for help. But the Supreme Help

comes from tuning in with Spirit.

Whenever you are in trouble, pray: “Lord, You are within me and all around

me. I am in the castle of Thy presence. I have been struggling through life,

surrounded by many kinds of deadly enemies. I now see that they are not

really agents for my destruction; You have put me on earth to test my

power. I am going through these tests only to prove myself. I am game to

fight the evils that surround me; I will vanquish them by the almightiness of

Your presence. And when I shall have passed through the adventure of this

life I will say: ‘Lord, it was hard to be brave and fight; but the greater my

terror, the greater was the strength within me, given by You, by which I

conquered and realized that I am made in Your image. You are the King of

this universe and I am Your child, a prince of the universe. What have I to

fear?’“

As soon as you realize you have been born a human being you have

everything to fear. There seems to be no escape. No matter what

precautions you take, there is always a misstep somewhere. Your only

security is in God. Whether you are in the African jungle or at war or

racked by disease and poverty, just say to the Lord, and believe: “I am in

the armored car of Your presence, moving across the battlefield of life. I am

protected.”

There is no other way to be safe. Use common sense and trust fully in God.

I am not suggesting something eccentric; I am urging you to affirm and

believe, no matter what happens, in this truth: “Lord, it is You alone who

can help me.”13 So many have fallen into ruts of disease and wrong habits

and have not pulled themselves out. Never say you cannot escape. Your

misfortune is only for a time. The failure of one life is not the measure of

whether or not you are a success. The attitude of the conquering man is

unafraid: “I am a child of God. I have nothing to fear.” So fear nothing. Life

and death are only different processes of your consciousness.

Everything the Lord has created is to try us, to bring out the buried soul

immortality within us. That is the adventure of life, the one purpose of life.

And everyone’s adventure is different, unique. You should be prepared to

deal with all problems of health, mind, and soul by commonsense methods

and faith in God, knowing that in life or death your soul remains

unconquered. You can never die. “No weapon can pierce the soul; no fire

can burn it; no water can moisten it; nor can any wind wither it....The soul

is immutable, all-permeating, ever calm, and immovable.”14 You are

eternally the image of Spirit.

Is it not freeing to the mind to know that death cannot kill us? When disease

comes and the body stops working, the soul thinks, “I am dead!” But the

Lord shakes the soul and says: “What is the matter with you? You are not

dead. Are you not still thinking?” A soldier is walking along and a bomb

shatters his body. His soul cries, “Oh, I am killed, Lord!” And God says,

“Of course not! Are you not talking to Me? Nothing can destroy you, My

child. You are dreaming.” Then the soul realizes: “This is not so terrible. It

was only my temporary earth-life consciousness of being a physical body

that made losing it seem the end of me. I had forgotten that I am the eternal

soul.”

The Goal of Our Life-Adventure

True yogis are able to control the mind under all circumstances. When that

perfection is reached, you are free. Then you know life is a divine

adventure. Jesus and other great souls have proved this. Nothing could

touch them. They enjoyed uninterruptedly the sweet romance with God. It

is the only part of the adventure that has any purpose.

Human love is meaningless unless anchored in the unconditional love of

God. A boy and a girl fall in love, and after a time they fall out of love.

Romance with human beings is imperfect. The romance with God is perfect

and everlasting.

You will finish this life-adventure only when you conquer its dangers by

your will power and mind power, as did the Great Ones. Then you will look

back and say: “Lord, it was a pretty bad experience. I came near failing, but

now I am in the safety of Your presence forever.”

We can see life as a wonderful adventure when the Lord finally says, “All

those terrifying experiences are over. I am with you evermore. Nothing can

harm you.”

Man is playing at life like a child, but his mind grows stronger through

fighting sickness and troubles. Anything that weakens your mind is your

greatest enemy, and whatever strengthens your mind is your haven. Laugh

at any trouble that comes. The Lord has shown me that this life is but a

dream. When you wake up, you will remember it only as a dream of joy and

sorrow that has passed. You will know you are everlasting in the Lord.

1 Matthew 10:29.

2 The telescopic gaze of intuition. During deep meditation the single or

spiritual eye becomes visible within the central part of the forehead. Great

yogis who live unbrokenly in the state of God-consciousness are able to

behold it whether meditating or carrying on ordinary activities.

3 Jesus spoke of the divine potential in that man who realizes the presence

of God within himself: “Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father

in me....I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he

do also; and greater works than these shall he do...” (John 14:11–12).

4 “Great saints who have awakened from the cosmic mayic dream and have

realized this world as an idea in the Divine Mind, can do as they wish with

the body, knowing it to be only a manipulatable form of condensed or

frozen energy. Though physical scientists now understand that matter is

nothing but congealed energy, illumined masters have passed victoriously

from theory to practice in the field of matter control” (Autobiography of a

Yogi, chapter 31).

5 Mahavatar, “great or divine incarnation”; Babaji, “revered father.” He is

the guru of Lahiri Mahasaya, who in turn is the guru of Swami Sri

Yukteswar, the guru of Paramahansa Yogananda. Babaji’s transcendental

life and powers are described in Autobiography of a Yogi.

6 In addition to his extraordinary age, Trailanga Swami was noted for his

many miracles. He weighed three hundred pounds, although he rarely ate.

Often he would meditate for days, seated on top of the Ganges waters; or

remain sometimes hidden for long periods under its waves. He was often

seen at the Manikarnika Ghat, sitting motionless in the sun on the blistering

stone slabs. His habitual disregard of nature’s laws was a constant reminder

to those who saw him that oneness with God is the highest law.

7 The vital essence, or sexual fluid, contains a high concentration of prana.

If not dissipated, the power therein can be used to enhance physical health,

mental vitality and creativity, and spiritual development.

8 “In my Father’s house are many mansions...” (John 14:2). The high and

low astral spheres, composed of subtle light and energies of lifetrons, are

the heaven (or hell) to which souls go after death of the physical body. The

length of stay there is karmically predetermined. So long as one has

unfulfilled material desires or earthly karma (effects of past actions not yet

worked out), he must reincarnate on earth to continue his evolution back to

God.

9 It is possible for the advanced yogi, through his interior union with

omnipresent God, to perceive sympathetically the experiences of all beings.

10 Genesis 2:7.

11 The essence of the astral body that dwells within man’s physical form,

activating and enlivening it. These nineteen elements are: intelligence, ego,

feeling, mind (sense consciousness); and the powers behind the five senses,

the five instruments of action, and the five pranas or life forces.

12 Bhagavad Gita VI:6.

13 “To men who meditate on Me as their Very Own, ever united to Me by

incessant worship, I supply their deficiencies and make permanent their

gains” (Bhagavad Gita IX:22).

14 Bhagavad Gita II:23–24.

Self-Analysis: Key to the Mastery of Life

First Self-Realization Fellowship Temple at Encinitas, California,

November 6, 1938

Let us leave the confines of ego and wander in the vast fields of soul

progress. As time is marching on, so must your souls march on to a greater

expansion of your life in Spirit. The initiative to undertake your most

important duty in life is often buried beneath the accumulated debris of

human habits. You must free yourselves from their stultifying influence and

start to sow the seeds of the success that you desire. Life is worthwhile

when you are accomplishing the most essential work, which is to find out

the meaning and true values of your existence.

Man should be instructed by this cosmic motion picture of life. It is not

being shown without a reason. Each day we behold different scenes, and

each day has a lesson to teach. You are meant to learn the lesson by

concentrating on the supreme purpose of human existence: to know Who is

behind your life.

Without Self-Analysis, Man Leads Robotlike Life

Millions of people never analyze themselves. Mentally they are mechanical

products of the factory of their environment, preoccupied with breakfast,

lunch, and dinner, working and sleeping, and going here and there to be

entertained. They don’t know what or why they are seeking, nor why they

never realize complete happiness and lasting satisfaction. By evading self-

analysis, people go on being robots, conditioned by their environment. True

self-analysis is the greatest art of progress.

Everyone should learn to analyze himself dispassionately. Write down your

thoughts and aspirations daily. Find out what you are—not what you

imagine you are!—because you want to make yourself what you ought to

be. Most people don’t change because they don’t see their own faults.

Everyone is the product of his heredity and environment. If you were born

in America you reflect certain American characteristics. If you were born in

China or England, you are likely to reflect the interests of those

nationalities. Your environment is the result of your true heredity—the traits

and desires acquired by you in past lives. This heredity of past incarnations

has led to your being born in the particular family and environment in

which you now find yourself.

When we read about the families of important people, we often note that

sons of great men are not necessarily of the same mental caliber as their

fathers. This failure of biological heredity in man raises a great doubt in our

minds: why don’t we find the same results in human life that we observe in

the plant and animal kingdoms, where good pedigree usually produces good

offspring? We must probe the inner life of man for an answer.

Traits From Past Lives Influence Us Now

In a literary family it is not unusual to find a boy who doesn’t like literature

at all. He has been brought up with literature-loving companions, yet has no

affinity for it. Why? Environment or heredity in the ordinary sense does not

explain it. But beyond these factors is reincarnation. We are born into a

particular family because of certain characteristics that are similar. But

every person in a family is an individual soul who brings his own

distinctive traits from his past lives. Hence there are always some biological

hereditary resemblances in families, yet each person is different in

character.

A man takes birth in a certain family, a particular social and national

environment, owing to specific causes—his own past actions. Therefore

man is the architect of his own destiny. One can almost predict what he will

be in his next life by analyzing his dominant interests and habits in this one.

Whatever You Have Done, You Can Undo

So self-analysis is important for the progress of the soul. Let us suppose

that tragedies have been your favorite reading for many years, and that you

naturally feel you will continue to enjoy them for the rest of your life. But if

you analyze yourself and see that you are becoming morose from constant

reading of this type of literature, you will wish to form a new habit of

perusing inspiring spiritual books. By doing so you will change the course

of your life. We can alter ourselves very quickly with strong determination;

but without it, one does not change effortlessly or in a minute the habit

patterns of years. To eradicate a habit of long standing you must apply the

full strength of your determination in counteractivity until the bad habit is

worn out. Most persons don’t have the necessary patience. But everyone

should feel encouraged by this truth: whatever you have created or done

you can undo.

When you analyze what you are, have a firm desire to banish your

weaknesses and to make yourself what you ought to be. Don’t allow

yourself to be overwhelmed with discouragement at the revelation of your

shortcomings that honest self-analysis usually brings.

Thought Produces Everything in the Universe

A theory has been advanced that thought is a product of the endocrine

glands. Such a conception is unfounded. Flesh cannot produce thought.

Mind is the architect of the microcosm and the macrocosm. As water by

cooling and condensation becomes ice, so thought by condensation assumes

physical form. Everything in the universe is thought in material form. The

endocrine organ is just a physical structurization of a microcosmic thought-

blueprint.

The physical and mental aspects of man are closely interrelated; it is

commonly observed that a person whose liver is out of order becomes

cranky. When you are bilious, you don’t feel like smiling and saying

“Peace” to everyone! You feel unamiable. Your thoughts and emotions are

affected by your physical state.

A weakening of the organs has a corresponding weakening effect on mental

power. Those who eat a great deal of meat are often surly and full of

vexation. If I were to put you on a grape juice diet for a week, it is likely

you would feel uplifted and harmoniously disposed toward all.1

I recently met a man who was wearing just a lightweight suit and no

overcoat, although it was terribly cold. He said he was seventy years old,

and that he never feels cold. He didn’t even wear socks! He had accustomed

his body to chilly weather. Mind influences body more than vice versa, but

the bodily chemicals do exercise a constant influence on the mind.2 Body

and mind are interdependent.

Dreams Reveal the Omnipotence of Mind

For example, suppose I am dreaming that I am awake and in the kitchen,

and very hungry. I eat something and drink a glass of milk. My hunger and

thirst are gone, and I feel satisfied. What was the cause of my satisfaction?

Was it the food? Remember, I am dreaming. Is it not simply a change of

thought that made me feel satisfied? Since I am dreaming, it is my mind

that thought it had taken food. The hunger and the food and the milk were

only ideas in my dream. All were made of the same mind-stuff. When I

wake up I realize that my experiences were nothing but a series of ideas. A

mere change of thought removed the unpleasant sensation of hunger and

substituted the pleasant sensation of eating food and drinking milk. So you

see, thought by itself can do anything.

Once I was traveling by train when the weather was extremely hot; the air

felt as if it were coming from a furnace. Everyone around me was suffering,

but I was smiling within because my mind was dissociated from the thought

of the heat. I had said to myself: “Lord, the same electricity that makes heat

in a furnace makes ice in a refrigerator. Therefore why shouldn’t I be able

to redirect that electricity of Yours to produce cold right now?” In that

instant I felt as if a sheet of ice had enveloped me.

Change Your Mental Attitude

We should bear in mind, however, that it is not wise to disregard the body

wholly. One should eat proper foods in preference to wrong foods. And if

you must live with people who make you nervous, then once in a while you

should change your surroundings. But it is better still if you can change

your mental environment, so that you won’t be disturbed by others’ actions.

Change yourself, and you can then live anywhere in peace and happiness.

Most of the world is like a mental hospital. Some people are sick with

jealousy, others with anger, hatred, passion. They are victims of their habits

and emotions. But you can make your home a place of peace. Analyze

yourself. All emotions are reflected in the body and mind. Envy and fear

cause the face to pale, and love makes it glow. Learn to be calm and you

will always be happy.

So remember, whatever type of ego you have, whatever personality you are

trying to express, you should make an effort to analyze your true nature and

to develop its best qualities. One may have a moral ego or a patriotic ego or

an artistic ego or a businessman’s ego, and so on. If morality is your ideal,

live uprightly and express your goodwill to all. That is real morality. It is

pride that makes self-righteous persons so ready to judge those about them

who are weak. True morality includes compassion for others in their

ignorant wrongdoings.

Those who are products of the material ego suffer much and needlessly.

Such persons should learn self-control; otherwise they are just like pieces of

matter in action—they have to smoke so many times a day, they must eat

certain foods, they always get a headache if they miss their lunch, they can

sleep only in a particular kind of bed. It is all right to utilize creature

comforts, but never be enslaved by them.

If you are a cross between an intellectual and a materialistic ego, that is

better. But unless you develop and maintain a balanced nature—

intellectually, materially, and spiritually—you are not going to be happy.

Your spiritual intuition tells you how to control your life, so that you are not

mastered by it. It is unwise to let the materialistic ego govern your

judgment; your conscience and intuition should decide.

The Conditions of Happiness: Plain Living, High Thinking

Plain living and high thinking should be your goal. Learn to carry all the

conditions of happiness within yourself by meditating and attuning your

consciousness to the ever-existing, ever-conscious, ever-new Joy, which is

God. Your happiness should never be subject to any outside influence.

Whatever your environment is, don’t allow your inner peace to be touched

by it. Analyze yourself; make yourself what you should be and what you

want to be. People seldom learn true self-control; they do things that are

detrimental to their highest welfare and think they are making themselves

happy; but they are not. To be able to do things when and because you

ought to do them, and to refrain from doing what you know is injurious—

these are keys to real success and happiness.

Don’t keep your mind engaged in too many activities. Analyze what you

get from them, and see if they are really important. Don’t waste your time.

To read a good book improves you much more than seeing movies. I often

say, “If you read for one hour, write in your spiritual diary for two hours;

and if you write for two hours, think for three hours; and if you think for

three hours, meditate all the time.” No matter where I go, I keep my mind

continuously on my soul peace. You too should always point the needle of

your attention toward the North Pole of spiritual joy. Then no one can ever

disturb your equilibrium.

Remember, if each day does not find you a better person than you were the

day before, you are going backward—in health, in mental peace, and in soul

joy. Why? Because you don’t exercise enough control over your actions.

You yourself made your habits, and you can change them. If you have been

thinking wrongly, make up your mind to be with good company and to

study and meditate. A change of company can make a great difference to

you. When you come here, even for these few hours, your mentality

changes; you feel a refreshing peace. When you go to a dance or a party

your mind is often restless, nervous, and excited. Afterward, if you enter a

different, calmer atmosphere, you feel more peaceful again. The greatest

influence in your life, stronger even than your will power, is your

environment. Change that, if necessary. Until you are mentally strong, you

can never be what you want to be without a good environment to help you.

When you are having difficulty in trying to change for the better, spiritual

company and other uplifting influences are essential.

Self-analysis is also essential to help you better yourself. If you can analyze

yourself fearlessly, you will be able to stand the critical analysis of others

without flinching.

Those who like to dwell on the faults of others are human vultures. There is

already too much evil in the world. Don’t talk of evil, don’t think of evil,

and don’t do evil. Be like a rose, wafting to all the sweet fragrance of soul

goodness. Make everyone feel that you are a friend; that you are a helper,

not a destroyer. If you want to be good, analyze yourself and develop the

virtues in you. Banish the thought that evil has any part in your nature, and

it will drop off. Make everyone else feel that you are an image of God, not

by your words but by your behavior. Emphasize the light, and darkness will

be no more. Study, meditate, and do good to others.

Seclusion Is the Price of Greatness

Seclusion is the price of greatness. Be alone within. Don’t lead the aimless

life that so many persons follow. Meditate and read good books more.

There are so many inspiring things to know, and yet man spends his time

foolishly. Happiness will never come if you don’t concentrate and act on the

wisdom of great men. Their thoughts are there to help you, in the scriptures

and other truthful books.

So don’t waste time, constantly seeking new excitement. Once in a while it

is all right to go to the movies and have a little social life, but mostly remain

apart and live within yourself. Happiness depends on meditation, on

knowing great minds through their thoughts in books, and on surrounding

yourself with people who are noble and kind. Enjoy solitude; but when you

want to mix with others, do so with all your love and friendship, so that

those persons cannot forget you, but remember always that they met

someone who inspired them and turned their minds toward God.

1 Overeating and improper eating create in the body excessive toxins that

have a definite negative effect on the mind, making it both sluggish and

irritable. Occasional fasting on grape or orange juice has a cleansing effect

on the system, which in turn vitalizes the brain. Such fasts, undertaken one

day a week, or occasionally for three days at a time, have been found

effective in helping to keep the body properly cleansed of impurities.

Fasting for longer than three days at a time should be under the supervision

of someone well trained in the science of fasting.

2 Serious research on the effect of diet and nutrition on mental health was

begun many years after Paramahansa Yogananda had made this

observation. Persons from poverty areas who were denied proper

nourishment showed decidedly slower mental development and responses.

In addition, science has shown that some forms of insanity (heretofore

considered incurable) improved remarkably with the simple administration

of vitamins, and that the causes of certain forms of depression, anxiety, and

other emotions can be traced to chemical imbalances in the system.

(Publisher’s Note)

Paramahansa Yogananda, 1926

Healing by God’s Unlimited Power

Self-Realization Fellowship Temple, Hollywood, California, August 31,

1947

There are three kinds of illness: physical, mental, and spiritual. Physical

sickness is due to different forms of toxic conditions, infectious disease, and

accidents. Mental sickness is caused by fear, worry, anger, and other

emotional inharmonies. Soul sickness is due to man’s ignorance of his true

relationship with God.

Ignorance is the supreme disease. When one banishes ignorance he also

banishes the causes of all physical, mental, and spiritual disease. My guru,

Sri Yukteswarji, often said, “Wisdom is the greatest cleanser.”

Trying to overcome various kinds of suffering by the limited power of

material curative methods is often disappointing. Only in the unlimited

power of spiritual methods may man find a permanent cure for the “dis-

ease” of body, mind, and soul. That boundless power of healing is to be

sought in God. If you have suffered mentally over the loss of loved ones,

you can find them again in God. All things are possible with His help.

Unless one really knows God, he is not justified in saying that only mind

exists and that one does not need to obey health laws or to use any physical

aids for healing. Until actual realization is attained, one should use his

common sense in all he does. At the same time one should never doubt

God, but should constantly affirm his faith in God’s omnipresent divine

power.

Doctors try to learn the causes of disease and to remove those causes so that

the illnesses do not recur. In their use of many specific material methods of

cure, doctors are often very skillful. However, not every disease responds to

medicine and surgery, and therein lies the essential limitation of these

methods.

Chemicals and medicines affect only the outer physical composition of the

bodily cells and do not alter the inner atomic structure or life principle of

the cells. In many cases no cure of disease is possible until the healing

power of God has corrected, from within, the imbalance of “lifetrons” or

intelligent life energy in the body. The two basic causes of disease are

underactivity and overactivity of the life energy, prana, that structures and

sustains the body. The improper functioning of any one (or more) of the

five governing pranic currents—vyana, circulation; udana, metabolism;

samana, assimilation; prana, crystallization; and apana, elimination—

adversely affects bodily health. When the natural harmonious balance of

these subtle energies is restored by God’s divine power, the atomic balance

of the physical cells they nourish is restored; the healing is perfect, and

often instantaneous. So long as balanced vitality is maintained by right

living, proper diet, and pranayama meditation (life-energy control

techniques), the body’s own life energy “electrocutes” disease before it can

develop.

Balanced Development Is Essential

Injury and disease are more often the cause of death than is old age. Most

people die before true old age has set in. In some cases, and they are

exceptional, all parts of the body grow weak at once; such persons die,

without pain, like ripe fruit that falls in due time from the tree. But the

majority are plucked from the tree of life before they are really ripe for

death.

In most cases of death, one bodily part had ceased functioning before the

rest. It may also happen that if one part is stronger or more developed than

another, the resulting imbalance of the life force in the body may cause

suffering and even death. For example, someone with a weak heart in a

strong-muscled body may injure his heart by overuse of his muscular

strength. Sandow,1 “the strong man,” died at fifty-eight when a blood

vessel in his brain burst as a result of his having raised a car singlehanded.

Overexercise that leads to unbalanced development may thus have harmful

consequences.

The Self-Realization Fellowship Energization Exercises2 place the least

strain on the heart and provide for a uniform development of the body.

Simple outdoor exercise, such as walking; balanced diet and moderation in

eating; and quiet meditation are all conducive to health.

Obey Nature’s Laws and Have More Faith in God

A master may ignore, without ill effect, dietary and other rules for health.

The ordinary individual, however, should be careful to maintain physical

well-being by right observance of the laws of nature.

One’s diet should be wisely chosen. The body requires for health certain

amounts of starch, protein, and fat, but in excess they can be harmful. Very

little starch is necessary; bread is no longer held to be the “staff of life.” Too

much starch in the diet, especially from white flour, causes an over-

accumulation of mucus in the body. (A certain amount of mucus is

necessary, of course, to prevent the entry of harmful microbes into the

mucous membranes.) Eat abundantly of foods that contain a high proportion

of mineral salts, such as fruits and vegetables. This type of diet prevents

constipation, which, when present, predisposes the body to many diseases.

Nature tries by reflex action to remove causes of physical distress. When

dust gets into the eye, we involuntarily try to wink the dust away. When dirt

or dust enters the nose, we sneeze. If we eat something unwholesome, we

get rid of it by regurgitation. When disease attacks any internal organ of the

body, nature provides many means by which the organ may protect, defend,

and renew itself. However, owing to various habits of living that alienate

most men from nature, their innate powers of recuperation and rejuvenation

become impaired and are prematurely lost.

Harmful microbes are ceaselessly attacking the body; good ones are

ceaselessly defending it, aided sometimes by diet, herbs, medicines, and

other health measures. But an unlimited source of protection for man lies in

his strong thought that, as a child of God, he cannot be affected by disease.

Mind has much greater power than medicine. But to deny any power to

medicine is unreasonable, because if drugs have no power, a man could take

poison and not die. While one should not deny the potency of medicines

and drugs, one should understand that continuous dependence on them will

prove their limitations; a time will come when they will lose their former

efficacy in restoring the body to health. The only infinite power of healing

lies in man’s mind and soul. The body cannot be healed by spiritual means

if the mental power and faith are weak. Permanent healing comes through

the boundless power of the mind and through God’s grace.

Fruits, Vegetables, and Nuts Superior to Meat

According to one school of thought, some diseases may be cured by eating

the organs of animals. A savage devours the heart of a lion in the belief that

his own heart will thus be invigorated. The tissues of chicken hearts are

known to have a strengthening effect on the heart of man; and the liver

helps those who are anemic. However, many health authorities state that

iron- and vitamin-rich foods such as eggs, cashew nuts, soybeans, molasses,

dried apricots, dried lima beans, dried peas, parsnips, spinach, and parsley

may successfully be substituted for liver in overcoming anemia. Pepsin

taken from animal organs is useful in cases of stomach ulcers; but papain, a

substance very similar to pepsin, is present in the fruit of the papaya, which

is a valuable healing aid to those who suffer from any form of impaired

digestion.

When man is sick he may feel justified in eating anything that has healing

value, but animal flesh is not actually necessary for this purpose; indeed, it

may increase the bodily burden by contributing toxins to the bloodstream.

Thus, while flesh foods may aid in healing one illness, they sometimes

create a condition whereby another disease may develop elsewhere in the

body. That is why the safest diet for man is fresh fruits, vegetables, finely

ground nuts, and vegetable and dairy proteins. In certain cases the system

may not tolerate raw fruits and vegetables, but the average person will

benefit by including them daily in his diet.

In vegetables and fruits God has infused medicinal power to help in

overcoming disease. Even these, however, have but a limited potency. The

organs of the body are essentially sustained by the energy of God, and the

person who employs various methods to increase this energy will have at

his command a greater power for healing than is afforded by any medicine

or diet.

Purify the Body of Harmful Toxins

Three-fourths of the body consists of water; hence the bodily demand for

water is much greater than that for food. (Death by thirst is a suffering more

acute than death by starvation.) It is important to give the body plenty of

water. Drinking unsweetened fruit juices also is good. In localities where

water has a calcium content high enough to dispose toward hardening of the

arteries in man, he should take, instead, fruit juices and watermelons,

cantaloupes, and similar juicy fruits. Some health researchers say, however,

that persons who have sinus trouble should not take citrus juices.

Make it a point to drink plenty of liquids (and I do not mean soda-water

beverages!) to wash away toxins in the body. But avoid drinking liquids

with meals, as this can be injurious to digestion. One tends to wash down

the food without chewing it properly. If starches are not partially digested in

the mouth, they often do not digest fully in the stomach. To chew food well

is important—the stomach has no teeth. Hasty eating is harmful;

particularly if large amounts of liquid are taken with the meal, thus diluting

the gastric juices. Also, drinking liquids with meals gives a tendency to

obesity.

It is important to keep the bloodstream healthy. Beef and pork may release

into the bloodstream toxic poisons and microbes. The white corpuscles try

to destroy the microbes, but if the latter are strong and if the white

corpuscles are insufficient to resist them, toxic reactions set in. For meat

eaters, fish, chicken, and lamb are preferable to beef and pork, which are

highly acid-producing.

The most important principle in connection with eating is to avoid any form

of overindulgence. As one learns to restrain himself he becomes healthier. It

may often happen that one’s desire for a certain food is so great that he

thinks he cannot resist it. His senses dictate to him, saying that he must eat

that food, even when he knows it may be harmful to him. If he refuses to

perpetuate his bad habits, he will find that he comes to dislike what is

injurious and to like what is beneficial. Greedy people fill themselves and

still they are looking for more food. By overeating, they dare to strain a

heart-pump that has been overworked for perhaps forty years!

Many persons thoughtlessly eat late at night. Usually sleep soon follows,

during which man’s internal machinery slows down. The food may lie in

the stomach without being properly digested. Eating shortly before the

nightly rest is therefore unwise.

There is nothing worse for body and mind, however, than drinking

intoxicating liquors. Under their influence a man may do things that in his

right mind he would be ashamed to do. Violence, greed, lust for money and

sex, even murder, may result from drunkenness. The belief that wine, sex

experiences, and money will bring happiness is said by the sages to be the

chief delusion that man must overcome in order to realize his true nature.

Liquor increases man’s desires for money and sex, and it is therefore the

worst evil of the three. It is an unnecessary and extremely dangerous

indulgence, because it stifles reason. A drunken man is no longer a true

man. It is wisdom to strive to maintain only normal appetites.

Increase Your Natural Resistance to Disease

Fasting is a natural method of healing. When animals or savages are sick,

they fast. The bodily machinery thus has an opportunity to cleanse itself and

to obtain a much-needed rest. Most diseases can be cured by judicious

fasting.3 Unless one has a weak heart, regular short fasts have been

recommended by the yogis as an excellent health measure. Another good

method of physical healing is through suitable herbs or herb extracts.

In using medicines, one often finds that they are not powerful enough to

bring about a healing, or that they are so powerful that they irritate the

bodily tissues instead of healing them. Similarly, exposure to certain types

of “healing rays” will burn the tissues. There are so many limitations in

physical methods of healing!

Better than medicines are the rays of the sun. In them is a wonderful healing

power. One should take a ten-minute sunbath every day. Ten minutes a day

is better than only occasional exposure for longer periods.4 A short sunbath

daily, reinforced by good health habits, will keep the body supplied with

sufficient life energy to destroy all harmful microbes.

Healthy persons possess a natural resistance to disease, and particularly to

infections. Illness comes when the resisting power of the blood has been

diminished by wrong eating or by overeating, or when overindulgence in

sex has depleted the vital energy. To conserve the physical creative energy

is to supply all the cells with vibrant life energy; the body then possesses a

tremendous resistance to disease. Sexual overindulgence weakens the body

and renders it vulnerable to illness.

You Can Increase Your Life Span

One naturally has a better chance to overcome sickness in youth than in old

age. (There are always exceptions, however, owing to karmic conditions.)

The average length of life today5 is sixty years. Many doctors agree that it

is easily possible to increase one’s life span by careful living.

Mahavatar Babaji and a number of other great masters have lived for

several hundred years. Life may be prolonged indefinitely—not by food,

medicine, exercise, sunbathing, and other limited means, but by contact

with the immeasurable power of God. We should think not only of the body

but also of the Spirit. If we attain perfection in oneness with Spirit, we shall

find perfection in body also.6

Many persons are continually busy looking after their physical welfare but

neglect the development of their minds. The key to all power lies in the

mind. If one fails to cultivate that power, when serious disease comes he

may die without making any resistance, regardless of his age.

The Power of a Smile

Conserve the vital energy, follow a balanced diet, and always smile and be

happy. He who finds joy within himself discovers that his body is charged

with electric current, life energy, not from food but from God. If you feel

that you can’t smile, stand before a mirror and with your fingers pull your

mouth into a smile. It is that important!

The healing methods I have touched on briefly in connection with food and

the cleansing of the body by herbs or fasting are limited in their

effectiveness; but when one is joyful within, he invites the help of the

inexhaustible power of God. I mean a sincere joyfulness, not that which you

feign outwardly but do not feel within. When your joy is sincere you are a

smile-millionaire. A genuine smile distributes the cosmic current, prana, to

every body cell. The happy man is less subject to disease, for happiness

actually attracts into the body a greater supply of the universal life energy.

There are many things to talk about on this subject of healing. The main

idea is that we should depend more on mind power, which is illimitable.

The rules for guarding against disease should be: self-control, exercise,

proper eating, drinking plenty of fruit juices, occasional fasting, and smiling

all the time—from within. Those smiles come from meditation. You will

find then the eternal power of God. When you are in ecstasy with Him you

consciously bring His healing presence into your body.

Permanent Healing Comes From God

Mind power carries with it the unfailing energy of God; that is the power

you want in your body. And there is a way to bring in that power. The way

is communion with God by meditation. When your communion with Him is

perfect, the healing is permanent. When the causative power of God comes,

the healing effect is instantaneous; no time is required for cause to ripen

into effect.

Many people in distress try to evoke that power, but when they are not

healed at once they lose faith in the Lord instead of continuing to try to

enlist His aid. The man who clings to the Divine is bound to be healed;

because God knows that the devotee is praying, and He cannot but respond.

But when you give up, the Father says, “All right. I see that you can do

without Me. I shall wait for you.”

The Supreme Power may be invoked by continuous faith and unceasing

prayer. You should eat rightly and do whatever else is necessary for the

body, but continuously pray to Him: “Lord, Thou canst heal me because

Thou dost control the life atoms and subtle conditions of the body that

doctors cannot reach with medicines.” The external factors of medicines

and fasting have a certain beneficial effect on the physical body, but they do

not affect the inner force that sustains the cells. It is only when you go to

God and receive His healing power that the life energy is directed into the

atoms of the bodily cells and produces instantaneous healing. Wouldn’t you

rather depend more on God?

But the attempt to change one’s dependence from physical to spiritual

methods should be gradual. If a man accustomed to overeating falls sick

and, with the intention of trying to achieve a mental healing, abruptly starts

fasting, he may be discouraged if success is not forthcoming. It takes time

to change one’s way of thinking from dependence on food to dependence

on mind. To be responsive to the healing power of God, the mind must be

trained to believe in divine aid.

Out of that Great Power all atomic energy is throbbing, manifesting and

sustaining every cell of the physical universe. As moving pictures are

sustained by a beam of light coming from the projection booth of a movie

house, so are all of us sustained by the Cosmic Beam, the Divine Light

pouring from the projection booth of Eternity. When you look to, and find

that Beam, you will behold Its unlimited power to rebuild the atoms and

electrons and lifetrons in all body cells that may be “out of order.”

Commune with the Great Healer!

1 Eugene Sandow (1867–1925), advocate of physical culture and wrestling,

noted for his physique and physical prowess. The famous athlete traveled

widely to expound his ideas on physical fitness.

2 These exercises, for energizing the body through conscious direction of

prana by will power, were developed by Paramahansa Yogananda in 1916.

They are taught in the Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons. (Publisher’s

Note)

3 In Armenia, Dr. Grant Sarkisyan has successfully used fasting to treat

patients for a variety of disorders, including bronchial asthma, skin

diseases, the initial state of arteriosclerosis, hypertension, stenocardia, and

digestive tract diseases. A selective diet is to be followed after discharge

from the hospital, the preference being for vegetable and fruit dishes, which

Dr. Sarkisyan feels are important for longevity.

In the Soviet Union, Dr. Uri Nicholayev administered fasting therapy for

more than two decades. He states that sixty-four percent of his patients have

been helped. Their illness is mental: schizophrenia.

At George Air Force Base, Victorville, California, twenty-five patients

underwent fasting treatment for up to eighty-four days for obesity. Sixteen

completed the program, with weight losses of forty to one hundred pounds.

Dr. Robert M. Karns, who conducted the experiment, also reported that a

forty-eight-year-old diabetic patient, who was receiving twenty-five units of

insulin daily before the fast, was able to discontinue the insulin treatment

after the fast. A sixty-year-old patient reported improvement of an arthritic

and heart condition.

In experiments with mice, which are often the testing ground for treatment

of man’s disorders, it was demonstrated that the life-span could be

increased by fifty percent. The treatment? Fasting. (Publisher’s Note)

4 It is wise to restrict sunbathing to the early and late hours of the day.

Precautions should always be taken to protect sensitive skin against

overexposure. If one has any questions regarding exposure to the sun, one

should consult and follow the advice of one’s doctor or a dermatologist.

(Publisher’s Note)

5 I.e., in 1947, when this talk was given.

6 Great ones who have attained the perfection of oneness with Spirit may

nevertheless endure intense bodily suffering—not because of any failure on

the part of Spirit, but because they choose, with divine permission, to work

out on their own bodies some of the karmic effects of others’ wrong actions,

in order to help those persons.

Eliminating the Static of Fear From the Mind

Radio

First Self-Realization Fellowship Temple at Encinitas, California, October

16, 1938

Everything in the universe is composed of energy, or vibration. The

vibration of words is, by extension, a grosser expression of the vibration of

thoughts. The thoughts of all men are vibrating in the ether.1 Because

thoughts have such a high vibratory rate, they have not yet been detected

there; but it is fortunate that we do not know the thoughts of all men.

Through the instrumentality of radio, you can push a button and lo, you

hear music and voices! If it were not for the intelligence in the ether,

through which the radio waves travel to your receiving set, you might hear

all the different broadcasts at once. God created the ether, and He planned

that man would create radio and radio-wave vibrations which could be

transmitted and received through this medium. Radio waves depend on the

ether for transmission, and on electricity for amplification in broadcasting

and receiving. The sounds of radio broadcasting are always present in the

ether, but are inaudible to us without a radio instrument. The vibratory

radio-waves represent thoughts that are being transmitted through space

into any receiving set that is tuned in.

When you are near and dear to someone, you can feel the thoughts of that

person; but you are probably not able to do this with anyone as far away as

India unless you have developed range. Those of you who practice

regularly the Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons on concentration and

meditation, and are very calm, will be able to feel the thoughts of others,

even from a distance. Your mind will become more sensitive.

We are all human radios: you receive the thought messages of others

through your heart,2 the center of feeling, and broadcast your own thought

messages through the spiritual eye, the center of concentration and will.

Your antenna is in the medulla, the center of intuitive superconsciousness.

Suppose you are away from home and you wish to perceive what is

happening there. If your feelings are very calm and your mind quiet, you

will be able to intuit the feelings and thoughts of your family at home.

When you become capable of great concentration, your feeling can

penetrate everywhere; your perception becomes charged with energy, with

electricity.

The World Is Only a Thought in the Mind of God

There is in reality no space3 between India and here. But we are in America

and we think we have to allow twenty-five days for a steamer trip before we

can reach India. According to material consciousness time is required to

traverse such a distance. But energy cuts down space. If we go by airplane,

the trip takes but seven days.4 The distance is decreased by the increased

energy of flight—the more energy, the more reduction of space or distance.

Suppose you are sleeping and you dream that you are going to India. You

take the train to New York, board the boat, stop at various ports of call, and

arrive in Bombay. All this can be done in minutes in the dream, because in

thought there is no space. Or suppose I am dreaming that I am dialing a

radio and I tune in India. There is no space; it is all an idea in my brain.

The whole world exists only in thought, such is the power of mind. Space is

a mental concept. I can close my eyes and think of things that are two

thousand miles away, and yet all those miles are a mere expansion of

thought. Space and time are merely differentiations of thought. What is the

difference between ice cream and hot coffee in a dream experience? When

you awaken, you realize that in the dreamland ice cream was one thought

and hot coffee another; they were merely two different ideas.

Thought has omniscient power. The kind of thought I am speaking of is the

thought of God. As He is omnipresent through thought, so are we. Are we

not already connecting the thought of America and the thought of India by

radio? There is no space there.

Often when you are trying to tune in a radio station, static comes in and

disturbs the program you are trying to hear. Likewise, when you are trying

to accomplish some personal transformation in your heart, “static” may

interrupt your progress. That static is your bad habits.

Fear Cannot Enter a Quiet Heart

Fear is another form of static that affects your mind-radio. Like good and

bad habits, fear can be both constructive and destructive. For example,

when a wife says, “My husband will be displeased if I go out this evening;

therefore I won’t go,” she is motivated by loving fear, which is constructive.

Loving fear and slavish fear are different. I am speaking of loving fear,

which makes one cautious lest he hurt someone unnecessarily. Slavish fear

paralyzes the will. Family members should entertain only loving fear, and

never be afraid to speak truth to one another. To perform dutiful actions or

sacrifice your own wishes out of love for another person is much better than

to do so out of fear. And when you refrain from breaking divine laws, it

should be out of love for God, not from fear of punishment.

Fear comes from the heart. If ever you feel overcome by dread of some

illness or accident, you should inhale and exhale deeply, slowly, and

rhythmically several times, relaxing with each exhalation. This helps the

circulation to become normal. If your heart is truly quiet you cannot feel

fear at all.

Anxieties are awakened in the heart through the consciousness of pain;

hence fear is dependent on some prior experience—perhaps you once fell

and broke your leg, and so you learned to dread a repetition of that

experience. When you dwell on such an apprehension your will is

paralyzed, and your nerves also, and you may indeed fall again and break

your leg. Furthermore, when your heart becomes paralyzed by fear, your

vitality is low and disease germs get a chance to invade your body.

Be Cautious But Not Fearful

There is hardly anyone who does not fear disease. Fear was given to man as

a cautionary device to spare him pain; it is not meant to be cultivated and

abused. Overindulgence in fear only cripples our efforts to ward off

difficulties. Cautious fear is wise, as when, knowing the principles of right

diet, you reason, “I won’t eat that cake, because it is not good for me.” But

unreasoning apprehension is a cause of disease; it is the real germ of all

sickness. Dread of disease precipitates disease. Through the very thought of

sickness you bring it on yourself. If you are constantly afraid of catching a

cold, you will be more susceptible to it, no matter what you do to prevent it.

Do not paralyze your will and nerves with fear. When anxiety persists in

spite of your will, you are helping to create the very experience you are

dreading. Also, it is unwise to associate more than is necessary and

considerate with people who constantly discuss their own and other’s

ailments and infirmities; this dwelling on the subject may sow seeds of

apprehension in your mind. Those who are worried they are going to

succumb to tuberculosis, cancer, heart trouble, should cast out this fear, lest

it bring about the unwelcome condition. Those who are already sick and

infirm need as pleasant an environment as possible, among people who

have a strong and positive nature, to encourage them in positive thoughts

and feelings. Thought has great power. Those who serve in hospitals seldom

fall ill because of their confident attitude. They are vitalized by their energy

and strong thoughts.

For this reason, as you get older, it is best not to tell others your age. As

soon as you do, they see that age in you and associate it with diminishing

health and vitality. The thought of advancing age creates anxiety, and thus

you devitalize yourself. So keep your age private. Say to God: “I am

immortal. I am blessed with the privilege of good health, and I thank Thee.”

Therefore be cautious, but not fearful. Take the precaution of going on a

purifying diet now and then, so that any conditions of illness that may be

present in the body will be eliminated. Do your best to remove the causes of

illness and then be absolutely unafraid. There are so many germs

everywhere that if you began to fear them you would not be able to enjoy

life at all. Even with all your sanitary precautions, if you could look at your

home through a microscope you would lose all desire to eat!

Techniques of Tuning Out Fear

Whatever it is that you fear, take your mind away from it and leave it to

God. Have faith in Him. Much suffering is due simply to worry. Why suffer

now when the malady has not yet come? Since most of our ills come

through fear, if you give up fear you will be free at once. The healing will

be instant. Every night, before you sleep, affirm: “The Heavenly Father is

with me; I am protected.” Mentally surround yourself with Spirit and His

cosmic energy and think: “Any germ that attacks me will be electrocuted.”

Chant “Aum” three times, or the word “God.” That will shield you. You

will feel His wonderful protection. Be fearless. That is the only way to be

healthy. If you commune with God His truth will flow to you. You will

know that you are the imperishable soul.

Whenever you feel afraid, put your hand over your heart, next to the skin;

rub from left to right, and say, “Father, I am free. Tune out this fear from

my heart-radio.” Just as you tune out static on an ordinary radio, so if you

continuously rub the heart from left to right, and continuously concentrate

on the thought that you want to tune out fear from your heart, it will go; and

the joy of God will be perceived.

Fear Ceases With the Contact of God

Fear is constantly haunting you. Cessation of fear comes with the contact of

God, nothing else. Why wait? Through Yoga you can have that communion

with Him. India has something to give you that no other nation has ever

given. I owe everything to my guru, Swami Sri Yukteswar; he was a master

in every way. It was by following his wisdom that I was able to succeed in

my mission in the West. He said, “Whatever you do, try to do it as nobody

else has done it before.” If you remember that thought, you will succeed.

Most people imitate others. You should be original, and whatever you do,

do well. All nature consciously communes with you when you are in tune

with God.

We often consider ourselves first, but we should always include others in

our happiness. When we do that from the goodness of our hearts, we spread

abroad a spirit of mutual consideration. If everyone in a community of one

thousand persons behaved this way, each one would have nine hundred and

ninety-nine friends. But if everyone in that community behaved like an

enemy to the other, each one would have nine hundred and ninety-nine

enemies.

Conquering the hearts of others by the power of love is the greatest victory

you can win in life. Always try to consider others first and you will find the

whole world at your feet. That was the greatness of Jesus. He lived and died

for all. Men of great material power who live only for themselves are soon

forgotten, but those who live completely for others are remembered forever.

The King of Kings had no throne of gold during his brief span on earth; but

he has reigned for twenty centuries on a throne of love in the hearts of

millions of people. That is the best throne to have.

A Single Thought May Lead to Redemption

When you came into this world you cried, whereas everyone else rejoiced.

During your lifetime, work and serve in such a way that when it is time for

you to leave this world, you will smile at parting while the world cries for

you. Hold this thought and you will always remember to consider others

before yourself.

This vast world was made that you might use your intelligence to acquire

knowledge of the Spirit, knowledge about your Self. Just one thought may

redeem you. You don’t realize how effectively your thoughts work in the

ether.

How would you know human love if God Himself didn’t give it to you by

planting His love in the heart of each being? And since God is so kind and

so loving, then He should be the object of your search. He doesn’t want to

impose Himself on you. But the mysterious working of your body, the

intelligence He has given you, and every other wonder in life should be

sufficient stimulus to make you determine to find God. Every human being

would be redeemed if he would try. You must try!

When I started in this path, my life at first was chaotic; but as I kept on

trying, things began to clear up for me in a marvelous way. Everything that

happened showed me that God is, and that He can be known in this life.

When you find God, what assurance and fearlessness you will have! Then

nothing else matters at all, nothing can ever make you afraid. Thus did

Krishna exhort Arjuna to face fearlessly the battle of life and become

spiritually victorious: “Surrender not to unmanliness; it is unbecoming of

thee. O Scorcher of Foes, forsake this small weak-heartedness! Arise!”5

1 The hypothetical ether is not considered necessary to present scientific

theory on the nature of the material universe. But Hindu scriptures refer to

ether as a fine vibratory “background” on which creation is superimposed.

It fills all interstices of space, and is the vibratory force that separates all

images, one from the other. (See ether and elements in glossary.)

(Publisher’s Note)

2 The occult seat, in man, of chitta, intuitive feeling.

3 Space and time are a part of the delusion of maya, which, to the

perception of mortals, divides and measures the indivisible Infinite. In

God’s consciousness, which is untouched by maya, and to the devotee

united with God in divine awakening, near and far, past, present, and future,

all dissolve in the eternal omnipresent Now.

4 Seven days in 1938, and today a complete earth orbit in a matter of

minutes by a spaceship! Time and space already have been greatly bent to

the will of man. “Tomorrow” he may conquer them. (Publisher’s Note)

5 Bhagavad Gita II:3.

Nervousness—Cause and Cure

Circa 1927

Nervousness is a malady that can be overcome by a specific medicine:

calmness. The disturbance of mental equilibrium, which results in nervous

disorders, is caused by continuous states of excitement or excessive

stimulation of the senses. Indulgence in constant thoughts of fear, anger,

melancholy, remorse, envy, sorrow, hatred, discontent, or worry; and lack of

the necessities for normal and happy living, such as right food, proper

exercise, fresh air, sunshine, agreeable work and a purpose in life, all are the

causes of nervous disease.

Any violent or persistent mental, emotional, or physical excitement greatly

disturbs and unbalances the flow of life force throughout the sensory-motor

mechanism and the lamps of the senses. If we connect a 120-volt bulb with

a 2,000-volt source, it would burn out the bulb. Similarly, the nervous

system was not made to withstand the destructive force of intense emotion

or persistent negative thoughts and feelings.

Far-Reaching Effects of Nervousness

Nervousness is no simple problem; it is a deadly enemy with far-reaching

effects. Physically, it is difficult to heal any disease so long as it is

aggravated by nervousness. Spiritually, an imbalance of life force in the

body makes it extremely hard for the devotee to concentrate or meditate

deeply enough to acquire peace and wisdom. But nervousness can be cured.

The sufferer must be willing to analyze his condition and remove the

disintegrating emotions and negative thoughts that are little by little

destroying him. Objective analysis of one’s problems, and maintaining

calmness in all situations of life will heal the most persistent case of

nervousness.

Realization that all power to think, speak, feel, and act comes from God,

and that He is ever with us, inspiring and guiding us, brings an instant

freedom from nervousness. Flashes of divine joy will come with this

realization; sometimes a deep illumination will pervade one’s being,

banishing the very concept of fear. Like an ocean, the power of God sweeps

in, surging through the heart in a cleansing flood, removing all obstructions

of delusive doubt, nervousness, and fear. The delusion of matter, the

consciousness of being only a mortal body, is overcome by contacting the

sweet serenity of Spirit, attainable by daily meditation. Then you know that

the body is a little bubble of energy in His cosmic sea.

The victim of nervousness must understand his case, and must reflect on

those continual mistakes of thinking which are responsible for his

maladjustment to life. When the nervous man once admits to himself that

his disease is not mysterious in its cause, but the logical outcome of his own

habits, he is already half cured.

The Nervous System

The nervous system is the telephonic outlet and inlet of the body, providing

man with his response to outer and inner stimuli. Excitement upsets the

nervous balance, sending too much energy to some parts and depriving

others of their normal share. This lack of proper distribution of nerve force

is the sole cause of nervousness. The calm man—he who avoids excitement

because he is not overly attached to his ego and is aware that God, and not

he, is running this universe—is always able to meet any situation in life

because his nerve force is equilibrated. Lord Krishna said: “The knower of

Spirit, abiding in the Supreme Being, with unswerving discrimination, free

from delusion, is thus neither jubilant at pleasant experiences nor downcast

by unpleasant experiences.”1 This is the goal we must strive for and attain.

The nervous system supplies life current to the brain, heart, and other parts

of the body. It distributes energy to the five senses of sight, hearing, touch,

taste, and smell. Nerves are our medium of contact with the outer world and

the source of all our sensory reactions. How important it is, therefore, to

keep the nerves in a state of perfect balance, not shocking one part of the

body with too much energy and consequently limiting the supply to other

regions. Not by restlessness or emotional reactions, but by calmness, by

deep trust in God, we reach the yogic state of an equilibrated being.

The yogis have special techniques by which one can revive tissues burned

out by nervousness, by sending life energy into nerves partially destroyed

by mistreatment. Each cell and tissue in the nervous system is a living,

intelligent structure. Life energy can always renew it.

Overcome Nervousness by Good Company

Nervousness is of two kinds—psychological and mechanical, or superficial

and organic. The psychological or most common variety is due to mind

excitement. This condition, long continued in, and accompanied by

association with uninspiring people and wrong diet and health habits,

causes the chronic or organic manifestations of nervous diseases.

The diet should be simple, balanced, and not too plentiful. Exercise should

be regular. Too much sleep drugs the nerves, and too little sleep is hurtful to

them. But all-important is the choice of company. Tell me what kind of

friends a man has and I will tell you what he is. Flatterers do not help us.

We should seek the society of superior men—those who tell us the truth and

help us to improve ourselves. He is our best friend who humbly suggests

how we may benefit our life by worthwhile changes.

Strong criticism, delivered in a mean or heartless way, is like hitting a man

on the head with a hammer. The power of love is infinitely more effective.

Kind suggestions, given with love and understanding, can accomplish

wonders; mere fault-finding accomplishes nothing. One is fit to judge

others only after he has perfected his own nature. Till then, judging oneself

is the only profitable analysis.

Association with calm, wise people is one of the quickest ways to banish

nervousness and realize our innate divinity. Nervous people should stay

away from those suffering from similar troubles.

Calmness Is the Best Cure

The best cure for nervousness is the cultivation of calmness. One who is

naturally calm does not lose his sense of reason, justice, or humor under any

circumstances. He can always separate sentiment or wishful thinking from

fact. He is not led astray by the honeyed tongues of dishonest men with

improbable schemes for acquiring unearned wealth. He does not poison his

bodily tissues with anger or fear, which adversely affect circulation. It is a

well-proven fact that the milk of an angry mother can have a harmful effect

on her child. What more striking proof can we ask for, that violent emotions

will finally reduce the body to an ignominious wreck?

Poise is a beautiful quality. We should pattern our life by a triangular guide:

calmness and sweetness are the two sides; the base is happiness. Every day,

one should remind himself: “I am a prince of peace, sitting on the throne of

poise, directing my kingdom of activity.” Whether one acts quickly or

slowly, in solitude or in the busy marts of men, his center should be

peaceful, poised. Christ is an example of that ideal. Everywhere, he

demonstrated peace. He passed through every conceivable test without

losing his poise.

God is everywhere, controlling planets, galaxies; yet He is not disturbed.

Though He is in this world, yet He is above this world. We must reflect His

image and likeness. We must meditate often and hold on to the peaceful

aftereffects. We must send out thoughts of love, goodwill, harmony. In the

temple of meditation, with the light of intuition burning on the altar, there is

no restlessness, no nervous striving or searching. Man is truly home at last,

in a sanctuary not made with hands, but with God-peace.

1 Bhagavad Gita V:20.

The Physical and Spiritual Rewards of Fasting

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, March 9, 1939

The physical results and spiritual experiences of fasting are wonderful. The

spirit within becomes disassociated from the demands of the body as the

body itself is freed from gross habits. I have just passed my thirtieth day of

dieting and fasting, and it seems as natural as if I had never eaten. All of

you who are able should go on a three-day fast; if possible, a longer one.1

You would begin to discover that you can live without food.

Pains or aches in the body indicate that something is going wrong with its

machinery; repairs are needed. Think how conscientiously you keep your

auto clean and in good repair. Much more complex than any car is the

human body; and the Lord wants you to keep it clean and in good running

order, also, while at the same time depending more on Him. The secret of

good health does not lie only in chemicals; one should rely even more on

God’s energy within.

This life force within our bodies is, in fact, the source of life. It is a

conscious power: the creator of the organs, and the supplier of their vitality

as well. Ordinarily, life force is continually reinforced by mind power and

food. But if it has been too much misused, it gives up and refuses to work

anymore. Its power may grow dim in the eyes, for example, and then you

cannot see well. No food gives strength, no change of air invigorates,

nothing can restore energy to the body when its life force begins to

diminish.

Fasting gives rest to the overworked organs, the bodily engines; and also to

the life force itself, relieving it of extra work. When you cease to make the

life force feel it has to depend for its existence on external sources—food,

water, oxygen, sunshine—it becomes self-supporting, independent.

It is overeating for three hundred and sixty-five days of the year that creates

many kinds of disease. Undeviating regularity in eating, whether the system

actually needs food or not, is also a curse to the body. The more you

concentrate on the palate, the more disease you will have. To enjoy food is

all right, but to be a slave to it is the bane of life. Why should you let nature

hurt you? Nature cannot punish you if you are not attached to the body or

bound by food. You must recognize that life force is the sustainer of the

body.

Without being fanatic, place the greatest emphasis on the mind, with the

object of making its power more and more dependable. If you insist on

making your mind a slave to your body, the mind will take revenge. It will

relinquish its power, so that you will have to depend on someone or

something else to help you; and no doctor or medicine can help any patient

if the patient’s mind has become so weakened that the disease has become

chronic. Three-fourths of the cure lies in the mind.

In India, we teach how to conquer the body so that one can rely to a greater

degree on the mind. Those who constantly look to physical means for health

and healing will be dependent on them always. But mental power is

superior. One should learn gradually to make greater use of the mind. By

doing so, you will realize that the mind is a superb instrument. Whatever

you command, it will do. This I have seen in my own life.

One day when I was giving a lecture in Milwaukee, it was terribly hot; my

face was streaming perspiration, but I couldn’t find my handkerchief. For a

moment I didn’t know what to do. Then I put my consciousness at the

Christ center and inwardly said, “Lord, my body is cool.” At once all

perspiration disappeared, and my body felt cool as could be! So it is good to

try to depend more on mind. However, you cannot deny the body entirely; if

you truly did so, you wouldn’t think or eat or move.

Some are interested in the power of mind over body principally to

demonstrate health. But health is not the purpose of life. Communion with

God is the purpose of life. You may feel well for a while, but a time comes

when nothing avails. Then who will help you? God. Fasting is one of the

great ways of approaching God: it releases the life force from enslavement

to food, showing you that it is God who really sustains the life in your body.

But the temptation of Satan is that as soon as the mind thinks “food,” you

want to eat. Once, as a little boy in India, I had a cold and I wanted to eat

some tamarind, which is considered very bad for colds. My sister strongly

disapproved, but because of my insistence she grudgingly brought me some

of the fruit. I took one piece, chewed it, and spit it out. Without my

swallowing the tamarind, the desire for its taste was satisfied. Since man all

too often acquires the habit of greed, it is unfortunate for him that God

didn’t create the body in such a way that he could enjoy the sense of taste

and let damaging excess or unhealthful food bypass the organs of digestion

and assimilation!

Self-Control—the Sanest Way to Health and Happiness

But in truth the only way to health and happiness, and the sanest way, is

self-control. To be master of yourself, so that you are not overpowered by

your senses, is one of the greatest blessings you can have. If you overload a

wiring system with too much electricity, it burns out. And every time you

load your digestive system with too much food, the life force burns out.

When you refrain from overeating, and when you fast, the life force takes

rest and becomes recharged.

If your auto is not working properly, you send it to a garage. It runs better

for a while, and then something else goes wrong and you send it back for

further repairs. The same must be done for the body. The physical effects of

fasting are remarkable. A fast of three days on orange juice will repair the

body temporarily, but a long fast will completely overhaul it.2 Your body

will feel as strong as steel. But if you want a permanent overhaul, then you

must also watch at all times what, and how much, food you take into your

body.

Know the Right Way to Fast

In fasting you must know what to do. That is why proper supervision is

necessary for a fast longer than three days. I don’t advise anyone to make

his first fast a long one, for he will become weak. A one-day fast on fruit

each week, or a three-day fast on orange juice each month, are good ways

to accustom oneself to fasting. The faster must be mentally prepared for

those who will immediately begin to sympathize and tell him that he will

become sick and die if he doesn’t eat. It is true that on a longer fast you may

feel weak during the first few days, because the life force has been

accustomed to dependence on food. But gradually, as the days pass, you no

longer feel any weakness. Your life force and spirit become detached from

food. You see that the body is sustained by life force alone.

I know the secret by which one can fast and still not lose weight. The life

force, when under one’s conscious control, may be utilized to take off flesh

or to keep the body at normal weight. Either way, it is effective. When this

principle is applied, the normal temperature of the body does not go down,

no matter how long one fasts. Drawing energy from the medulla, the

“mouth of God,”3 the life force begins to rely more and more on its innate

regenerative power instead of depending on outside sources.

Human beings in a perfect state of suspended animation can be buried for

five thousand years or unto eternity and remain alive. Life is eternal. It

depends not on breath, nor on food, water, or sunshine. Remember always

that you are the Imperishable Spirit. This is the way to live.

Our consciousness survives after death, but the ordinary man loses that

feeling of continuity and so thinks he is dead. Every one of us is going to

die someday, so there is no use in being afraid of death. You don’t feel

miserable at the prospect of losing consciousness of your body in sleep; you

accept sleep as a state of freedom to look forward to. So is death; it is a

state of rest, a pension from this life. There is nothing to fear. When death

comes, laugh at it. Death is only an experience through which you are

meant to learn a great lesson: you cannot die. Why wait for death when you

can realize this now? The first lesson you have to learn is that life is not

dependent on food. By fasting you can prove it to yourself.

Function Well Under All Circumstances

Everyone should develop his mental power, so that he is able to function

well under all circumstances—sleep or no sleep, food or no food, vacation

or no vacation. Regularity is admirable and necessary; we must acquire the

habit of regularity in order to obey the laws of God. But to be unable to

deviate from that habit without ill effect is wrong.

All the fundamental habits of a child are formed between the ages of three

and seven. Good environment will help to guide his development, but to

change (if desirable) the salient tendencies of a child, special training is

required. In my school in Ranchi, India, I gave the boys rigid training of the

body. They fasted often, and slept on a blanket on the floor, never using

pillows. Sometimes they meditated for hours. To help children by rigid

discipline to be free from the tyranny of the body is to confer on them a

lifelong blessing. One of the schoolboys sat for twelve hours in meditation

without winking his eyes. If you had such poise, how much happier you

would be! How much more peace you would have! The greatest training

lies in scientific, balanced discipline of the body, mind, and spirit. And in

that lies the heart of fasting.

The Metaphysical Science Behind Fasting

There is a great metaphysical science behind fasting. Jesus reminded us of

this truth when he said: “Man shall not live by bread alone....” Two things

keep you bound to earth: breath and “bread.” In sleep, however, you are

peacefully unaware of any need for either breath or food; your spirit is

detached from body-consciousness. Fasting uplifts the mind in the same

way. Through fasting, let your mind depend on its own power. When that

power manifests, the life force in the body becomes increasingly reinforced

with the eternal energy continually flowing into the brain and spine from

the cosmic energy around the body, entering through the medulla.

Becoming detached from dependence on outer physical sources of bodily

sustenance, the life force sees that it is being supported from within, and

wonders how this is so. The mind then says: “The solids on which the body

used to depend are nothing more than gross condensations of energy. You

are pure energy. And you are pure consciousness.” Then, whatever

command the mind impinges on the consciousness of the life force, it will

manifest accordingly.

Anything can be done by mind power. So you see how unjust it is to the

mind and to the all-powerful life force within you, to say you can’t live

without food. Make your life and body impervious to suffering. Conquer

yourself. By long fasting you realize that everything is mind.

Every force and object in this universe is a product of the Divine Mind, in

the same way that all the things you perceive in a dream are creations of

your own mind. On the conscious plane also, if your mind creates the

thought that the body will be weak from fasting, it will be weak; or if you

have been fasting, and momentarily think it is making you weak, the body

will actually feel weak. But if you make up your mind that the body is

strong, it will not feel any weakness; rather, it will feel great power. Most

people do not know this because they have never tried it. The mind will not

show its miracles unless you make it work. And it will not work so long as

you continue to depend more and more on material things. That is why its

marvels remain hidden from ordinary vision. But when, through fasting,

you learn how to depend on mind, it will work in everything, whether

conquering disease, or creating prosperity, or realizing the supreme goal of

life—finding God. “The self-governed yogi—he whose mind is fully under

control—thus engaging his soul in ceaseless meditative union with Spirit,

attains the peace of My being: the final Nirvana (deliverance).”4

1 Persons in good health should experience no difficulty in fasting for three

days; longer fasts should be undertaken only under experienced

supervision. Anyone suffering from a chronic ailment or an organic defect

should fast only upon the advice of a physician experienced in fasting

procedures.

2 See previous footnote.

3 Matthew 4:4: “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word

(prana, life energy) that proceedeth out of the mouth of God (that flows

forth from the medulla into the body).” It is through the center of

superconsciousness in the medulla that God breathes his “word”—cosmic

intelligent vibration, or energy—into man. A reservoir of this energy

accumulates in the brain. Thence it flows down from the medulla into the

five spiritual centers (chakras) in the spine, which act as distributors,

feeding this life energy to all parts of the body.

4 Bhagavad Gita VI:15.

Self-realization: Criterion of Religion

Self-Realization Fellowship Temple, Los Angeles, California, August 22,

1933

First Self-Realization Fellowship Temple, Encinitas, California, August 27,

1939

(Compilation)

The temple God loves most is the temple of His devotee’s inner silence and

peace. Whenever you enter this beautiful temple here,1 leave restlessness

and worries behind. If you do not let go of them, God will not be able to

come to you. First establish in yourself a temple of beauty and peace; there

you will find Him, on the altar of your soul.

Sometimes one feels discouraged, thinking it is too late to find God. It is

never too late. The Bhagavad Gita teaches that if one realizes that this

world is false and only Spirit is real, though it be in the last moment before

death, he will enter a better world after his earth-exit.2

Sooner or later each one of us will be taken away from this earth. Find out

now what life is all about. The great purpose of your experiences here is to

stimulate you to search out their meaning. Don’t give importance to this

procession of humanity. As time marches on, you must eventually realize

that you are a part of the great One. Make God-realization your goal.

Mahavatar Babaji said that even a little bit of this dharma—righteous

action, seeking to know God—will save you from dire fears.3 The prospect

of death, or of failure or other grievous troubles, awakens in man a great

dread. When you are helpless to help yourself, when your family cannot do

anything for you, when no one else can give you aid, what then is the state

of your mind? Why allow yourself to be put in such a position? Find God,

and anchor yourself in Him. Before anyone else was with you, who was

with you? God. And when you leave this earth, who will be with you? Only

God. But you won’t be able to know Him then unless you make friends

with Him now. If you deeply seek God, you will find Him.

Everything in creation is a temptation to lure you from God. But He is more

tempting than any earthly temptation. If you attain even a glimpse of Him

you will realize this; and you can find Him by inner prayer and meditation

and by strong determination. Your resolutions with God must be firm; He

will not come so long as your mind is roaming elsewhere. He wants to

come to you but you don’t let Him; you would rather seek a little sense

pleasure or spend your time on books or cocktail parties. So God says, “All

right, My child, play on.”

If God is seeking anything, it is our love. He knocks at every heart and asks

us to come unto Him, but most persons don’t want to go. Yet when they get

into trouble or become sick, they are quick to call for Him. He who makes

friends with the Lord while he is prosperous and happy will always find

God near when he needs Him. But he who procrastinates in forming that

relationship will have to fight his tests alone until, through wisdom and

unconditional surrender, he finds the Eternal Friend.

Out of this great mass of humanity only a few are deeply seeking God.

Where are they who thought this earth was theirs two hundred years ago?

All are gone—and from among them perhaps only a few understood the

truth about life and became Self-realized devotees of the Lord.

Nevertheless, each succeeding generation thinks this life is real! For the

little while you are here you make much of this show. Don’t become too

involved in it. Find God! He is trying to draw us with His love. He is

showing us all the miracles we could want to see—the wonders of growing

things and the perfect routine in nature. He is right there behind the flowers.

Seek Him out. The scientist didn’t make his discoveries by the use of blind

prayer; he followed the laws of science. If you apply scientific spiritual

laws with sincere devotion, God will be with you automatically. Open your

eyes of devotion, for by continuous ardor plus application of spiritual law

you will find Him.

Spiritual Development Must Balance Material Advancement

Different nations have specialized in different arts and sciences; India

mastered the scientific art of God-realization. I have come to teach you

India’s spiritual science. Unless a balance is created by developing spiritual

realization along with advancement of the physical sciences, individuals

and nations will be lost in misery and destruction. If today’s world leaders

were illumined by Self-realization, and worked together, they could within

a few years banish war and poverty from the earth. Only spiritual

consciousness—realization of God’s presence in oneself and in every other

living being—can save the world. I see no chance for peace without it.

Begin with yourself. There is no time to waste. It is your duty to do your

part to bring God’s kingdom on earth.

Many persons hesitate to seek God, imagining that life will then have to be

gloomy. Not so! The unalloyed happiness I find in communing with the

Lord no words can describe. Night and day I am in a state of joy. That joy is

God. To know Him is to perform the funeral rites for all your sorrows. He

does not require you to be stoic and morose. This is not the right concept of

God, nor the way to please Him. Without being happy you will not even be

able to find Him. The more peaceful you are, the more you will be able to

feel His presence. The happier you are, the greater will be your attunement

with Him. Those who know Him are always happy, because God is joy

itself.

People try to find happiness in drink, sex, and money, but the pages of

history are filled with tales of their disillusionment. The time I have spent in

meditation has made my life unimaginably fruitful. A thousand bottles of

wine could not produce the joy it has given me. In that joy is the conscious

guidance of God’s wisdom. When you are attuned with Him in this way,

even though you unwittingly do wrong it will be righted by the Lord’s

omniscient direction; if you make a poor judgment it will be corrected by

Him.

Wait no longer! Whoever hears this message, know that I am speaking

truth. It is His voice, His power, His authority. If I were to display all the

powers that God has given to me, throngs would come. But I do not seek

that kind of following. Not powers, but the love of God must attract you;

for only then will you change and make an effort to know Him. That is my

aim.

I could not preach about God in this way if I did not know Him. In the same

way you can know Him. That is why I stress Self-realization, which means

you can know within your own consciousness that what I am saying is true.

You don’t have to believe; you can know. If I had a thousand mouths, I

would speak through them all to convince you.

My Only Wish Is to Give You a Glimpse of God

You don’t realize how much you miss God, because you have never known

Him. Once you do contact Him, no power on earth will be able to turn you

away from Him. My only wish is to give you a glimpse of God, because

having Him, no other gain is greater. Satan tempted Jesus with dominion

over the whole world; but he said, “Get thee behind me, Satan.”4 Jesus had

that Something which is infinitely greater. Knowing God is more satisfying

than the fulfillment of any earthly desire. Every lesser wish of your heart

will be taken care of when you have Him who is your greatest Treasure.

This is my own true testimony. He fulfilled my every desire. I do not seek

things now; they seek me. When God gives Himself to you, He will fulfill

your slightest wish. It is not necessary to ask. That is the state you want.

But first you have to prove that you desire the Lord Himself more than His

gifts.

Out of the abundance God has given me I have kept nothing for myself. I

am always free, for nothing belongs to me. I am working only for Him and

for all of you. Because of this, anytime the thought of some need crosses

my mind, God fulfills it. I have to take care what I mentally tell the Lord,

for it is sure to materialize! This state of satisfaction no worldly prosperity

can give.

God is seeking you; you must seek Him. Follow this Self-Realization way.

It will bring you to Him more quickly than any other path. I have tried all

methods; and I entered this path on the basis of reason, not emotion.

Through the demonstration of their own realization, the great masters of

Self-Realization Fellowship have shown that by following their way you

can find the Lord, you can be among the greatest of the spiritually great,

just as by learning from a great scientist you can become a great scientist, if

you apply yourself. Charcoal does not receive and reflect the sunlight, but

the diamond does. Charcoal mentalities, full of doubts and negation and

spiritual slothfulness, cannot receive God. But diamond mentalities, sincere

and full of faith and perseverance, receive and reflect the wisdom of Divine

Consciousness.

It Is Necessary to Understand the Meaning of Religion

To most persons religion is a matter of family tradition or social benefit or

moral habit. They have no conception of the importance of religion. When I

asked one man what religion he followed, he replied: “Nothing in particular.

I change churches according to convenience.”

Those who are not seeking God as the paramount necessity of life do not

understand the meaning of religion. Why do all people seek money?

Because they are conditioned to the thought that money is essential to

supply the things they need for their well-being. They don’t have to be told

this; they simply know it. Why then do most people not understand the

necessity of knowing God? Because they lack imagination and

discrimination. Very early in life I saw that theological and even scriptural

answers to certain questions could never fully satisfy the soul, unless their

truth were experienced through realization and God-communion. For

example, when my mother died and when other loved ones began to be

taken away from me, I rebelled inwardly against it; but no one could give

me an explanation that satisfied me. I decided I had to go find the answer

myself, through my own effort. “I am not going to accept this blindly,” I

vowed. “I am going to find the answer from Him who is the Maker of this

universe.” I sought directly from God the understanding of life’s mysteries

that I could not find in the teachings in the churches and temples. If religion

could not satisfy me as to why some persons are born poor and some rich,

some blind and some healthy, how could it convince me of the justice of

God? The masters of India, by attaining God-communion, found the

answers to life’s riddles through inner realization, and showed us how we

can do likewise.

There are many kinds of religionists in the world, and each religion has its

own cross-section of this diversity. There are those whose approach to

religion is wholly emotional. When their feelings are played upon too much

they become hysterical with religion. But in an extreme display of emotion

one loses touch with God. Emotionally excitable types want “pep” in

religion; when you lecture from the intellectual plane they fall asleep. It is

too dull, they say. But playing upon others’ emotions is simply juggling

with their minds; it is not giving them Truth, or God.

The intellectual religionist delights in hearing about various theological or

philosophical concepts, flattering himself that he is on a higher rung of

divine understanding than the emotional religionist. But intellectual

stimulation, also, is only another kind of “drug,” a different form of mental

juggling that does not give the seeker what he really needs, any more than

does over-stirring of the emotions.

Religionists who cling blindly to dogma will often parrot what they do not

really understand or have not realized. When you ask them questions, they

quote scriptures and tenets like spiritual victrolas. It is useless to reason

with them because they are so sure they know it all.

True Religion Satisfies the Demands of Your Soul

Dogmatic religionists are convinced that if you do not believe in a certain

way you are doomed. Science does not teach you in that way; it proves its

points. And true religion satisfies the demands of your soul, not by words

but by proof. I wanted never to be so dogmatic that I would stop using my

reason and common sense. When I met my guru, Sri Yukteswar, he said:

“Many teachers will tell you to believe; then they put out your eyes of

reason and instruct you to follow only their logic. But I want you to keep

your eyes of reason open; in addition, I will open in you another eye, the

eye of wisdom.”5 Sri Yukteswarji gave me a teaching whose truth I could

realize for myself. That is why I followed this path. No one can shake me

from it.

The liberalist is the other extreme of the dogmatist. He follows everything!

In the belief that he is being broadminded he says, “All spiritual paths are

good; therefore I will not bind myself to any one of them.” While

respecting all, it is better to adhere to one path than to be a religious

butterfly, flitting everywhere. Avoid both false liberality and blind

dogmatism. Cling dogmatically only to wisdom, and you will find God.

Every effort one makes for God will be noticed by Him. However, if one

doesn’t follow a proven scientific way to God, his progress is comparable to

riding in an old bullock cart. Sincere seekers will receive some realization,

no matter what path they follow; but with only blind belief and mechanical

prayers it could take them incarnations to reach the Lord.

Whatever Religion You Choose, Give It a Good Test

Seek until you find the path most suited to the spiritual inclination of your

heart and mind, and then be steadfast. Whatever you take up, give it a good

test. In the same way give the Self-Realization teachings a chance. Jewelers

can tell a good gem from a fake, and the genuine spiritual teacher can

differentiate between sincere and idle seekers. There are some who take the

Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons but do not study or practice them. Ask

them what the teaching is about, and they reply vaguely, “Oh, it is grand!”

If you ask what they have learned, they go on about what a good teaching it

is, “but I haven’t practiced it.” Those who practice know the blessings of

this path.

Seekers should be taught to find God first. To concentrate on money or

health as primary objectives in following a religion is to become

sidetracked. True, it is through God that one receives everything else; but he

who seeks other things first will feel the bonds of limitations. A qualified

spiritual teacher knows and loves the Lord; his supreme interest is in God.

One teacher tried to persuade me to accept his spiritual guidance with the

promise that I would have a great many followers. His offer did not attract

me, because I wanted God alone. Great teachers will always seek to interest

you in knowing the Lord. They will not take you up a blind alley.

Without God-communion, the lifeblood of religion is missing. Church is not

the place for dances, movies, and frequent social gatherings. These divert

people from God. One can find sufficient worldly entertainment in town.

Go to church for one reason: communion with God. Divine communion is

the criterion of religion. That is what my Guru taught me, and that is why I

have followed him unconditionally and wholeheartedly. As a result of his

teaching I am enjoying that sacred communion with the Lord every moment

of my existence. That is what religion must be.

If I tell you of a wonderful fruit I have found, and describe it to you in

detail every day for a year without ever giving you a taste of it, you won’t

be satisfied. Hearing about truth cannot relieve the soul’s hunger; if you are

content to hear truth without making any effort to know God, it has falsely

satisfied you. You must hunger so deeply for God that you will seek Him

out in earnest. The purpose of religious lectures and sermons is to awaken

in you that irresistible soul-longing for Him.

Realizing God Requires Self-Disciplinary Effort

Once in a while I meet someone in whom I see a little bit of real devotion

for the Lord. But God-realization is so much greater than that! The God-

knowing devotee sometimes sees the whole world filled with His light—a

wonderful experience. But it can’t come to you in one minute. Realizing

God requires long perseverance in the practice of those methods that lead to

Self-realization.

The desire for happiness is the strongest desire of all. True and lasting

happiness is found in God. When you discover Him, a great joy will come

over you, a joy you will find nowhere else. Sri Yukteswarji said to me:

“When your joy in meditation and communion becomes greater than any

other joy, you have found God.6 If the whole world were given to you, you

would not know what to do with it; you would only feel burdened, worrying

about everything. Study the lives of princes and men of the world; see how

they were vexed.” We are like puppets in the hands of destiny; but the man

who is one with the Light of the world, who has nothing and yet has

everything, is a happy man. He who is one with God is not afraid of

anything, even annihilation of the body. Jesus said: “Destroy this temple,

and in three days I will raise it up.”7

The church has become a beggar. Ironically, money is needed in the

development of all good works, including those performed by the church.

The dollar itself has no brains; it can serve both good and evil schemes. To

seek money to spread God’s work is righteous action. Money thus used is

doing good. And the more one sacrifices for God’s work, the greater will be

his reward.

All Churches Should Be Hives of God-Communion

Every church does good, and for that I love them all. They will truly fulfill

their high calling when they become places of God-communion. They

should be like hives, filled with the honey of God-realization. Unless this

truth becomes more manifest in religion, you will see that the church as

such will gradually disappear. Religion will be practiced in secluded spots

out-of-doors, where God can come to those few devoted souls who really

want to know Him. This has happened in India. Some of her temples have

become not so much places of meditation for divine communion as mere

gathering places for pigeons and people. Real seekers in India gather under

the trees to meditate on God. More and more this will happen in churches

everywhere. The dissatisfaction of real truth seekers with dogmatism, and

the emptiness of organization without individual Self-realization, will force

a great world change in the concept of religion.

Scientific Methods Needed to Follow the First Commandment

“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul,

and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbor as

thyself.”8 These two commandments sum up the whole purpose of religion.

If you sincerely love God you will do only what is based upon truth. Your

love will not allow you to err against Him. Bring in the light, and darkness

will vanish as though it had never been. Bring in love of God and the

darkness of ignorance flies away. The science of yoga explains the truth

behind the first commandment, and gives definite scientific techniques that

enable the devotee to attain the divine communion necessary in order to

love God so completely. Behind each part of these commandments is a deep

metaphysical truth:

“Love the Lord...with all thy heart”: It is God who has given you the power

to love your family and friends. Why should you not use that power to love

Him as you love your dearest ones on earth? You should be able to say:

“My Lord, I love You as the father loves the child, as the lover loves the

beloved, as the friend loves the friend, as the master loves the servant. I

love You with the strength of all human loves, for Thou art my Father, my

Mother, my Friend, my Master, my Beloved.” When you truly love God

with all your heart, you feel that love for Him day and night.

As I was leaving home to seek God I was inwardly torn by the conflict of

loyalties. My father had done everything for me, and the whole family was

crying over my imminent departure; but the love of God was stronger, and I

was able to overcome the limitations of familial love.

Many human beings say “I love you” one day and reject you the next. That

is not love. One whose heart is filled with the love of God cannot willfully

hurt anyone. When you love God without reservation, He fills your heart

with His unconditional love for all. That love no human tongue can

describe.

“...and with all thy soul”: You cannot fulfill this part of the commandment

unless you know your soul. You know it in an unconscious way each night,

for in deep sleep you are aware only of existing; you have no consciousness

of being either man or woman. You are soul. You can consciously know

your soul—your true self—by meditation. And when you know yourself as

soul you will have discovered the presence of God within you. The moon’s

reflection cannot be seen clearly in ruffled water, but when the water’s

surface is calm a perfect reflection of the moon appears. So with the mind:

when it is calm you see clearly reflected the moonèd face of the soul. As

souls we are reflections of God. When by meditation techniques we

withdraw restless thoughts from the lake of the mind, we behold our soul, a

perfect reflection of Spirit, and realize that the soul and God are One.

“...and with all thy strength”: This aspect of the commandment is highly

scientific. It means withdrawing all your strength—all your energies and

consciousness—into their source, which is God. Yoga teaches you how to

control your life energies and transmute them from body-consciousness into

God-consciousness.

“...and with all thy mind”: When you are praying to God, your attention and

concentration should be wholly on Him. You should not be thinking about

your Sunday dinner or your work or any other worries and desires. The

Lord knows your thoughts. Krishna said: “Whenever the fickle and restless

mind wanders away—for whatever reason—let the yogi withdraw it from

those distractions and return it to the sole control of the Self.”9 When I pray

to God, my mind stays riveted on Him. If you develop that calm intensity of

concentration you will find that a time comes when no matter what else you

are doing, days and nights pass with your mind inwardly absorbed in God.

“...and thy neighbor as thyself”: The ordinary man is incapable of loving

others in this way. Self-centered in the consciousness of “I, me, and mine,”

he has not yet discovered the omnipresent God who resides in him and in

all other beings. To me there is no difference between one person and

another; I behold all as soul-reflections of the one God.10 I can’t think of

anyone as a stranger, for I know that we are all part of the One Spirit. When

you experience the true meaning of religion, which is to know God, you

will realize that He is your Self, and that He exists equally and impartially

in all beings. Then you will be able to love others as your own Self.

Self-realization Converts Conviction Into Experience

Truth alone should be the binding force of religion. Truth I have brought to

you through Self-Realization Fellowship. This work is spreading because of

the wisdom and blessings of the God-realized Masters behind it. All over

the country I have seen wonderful students who are held to this spiritual

path for one reason: Self-realization. My only plan to hold people is by their

own Self-realization. That is the only way I wish to hold them. If there are

hundreds in my classes, all right; if there are empty seats, it is all right. I

never wish for anything. I would rather have a few real souls than hundreds

without sincerity. The great purpose behind this movement is to give people

their own Self-realization. When people will realize that it is their duty and

privilege to know God, then a new era will come on earth. Scriptures,

sermons, and lectures eventually cease to satisfy the seeker who truly longs

to feel the presence of God; but when he realizes truth, he knows life as it

should be.

Practice the truth you hear and read about, so that it is not just an idea but a

conviction born of experience. If reading books on theology satisfies your

desire for God, you have not grasped the purpose of religion. Do not settle

for intellectual satisfaction about truth. Convert truth into experience, and

you will know God through your own Self-realization.

Practice Truth—Meditate—for God-Communion

What is needed is spiritual experience. Only divine communion can remove

the great boredom that exists when one is not following the spiritual path

scientifically. What is necessary in order to have that spiritual experience?

The habit of daily meditation. God is realizable. You can know Him now,

through meditation. Then without any question, without any doubt, without

a speck of mental reservation you can say: “I am with God.” Why not? He

is your own.

The time has come for man to know truth for himself. That which I am

giving to you is self-realizable. To some the Self-Realization Fellowship

Lessons may seem just another course of philosophical study, to be added to

one’s library; but those who practice them know their value. With every

new spiritual instruction I received from Sri Yukteswarji he said, “You must

know this truth.” And I did. In the beginning of my spiritual search in India

I had steadfastly refused to join any society because I didn’t find in them

demonstrable truth. But when I found my Guru and this path, and saw

through my own experience that it worked, I gave my life to this cause.

1 Golden Lotus Temple formerly at Encinitas, California.

2 “O Arjuna! this is the ‘established in Brahman’ state. Anyone entering

this state is never (again) deluded. Even at the very moment of transition

(from the physical to the astral), if one becomes anchored therein, he attains

the final, irrevocable, state of Spirit-communion” (Bhagavad Gita II:72).

3 Paraphrasing the Bhagavad Gita, II:40.

4 Luke 4:8.

5 The eye of intuition, or divine wisdom; the omniscient spiritual eye. “The

deluded do not perceive Him staying or departing or experiencing the world

of the gunas (qualities). Those whose eye of wisdom is open see Him”

(Bhagavad Gita XV:10). “When thine eye is single, thy whole body also is

full of light....Take heed, therefore, that the light which is in thee be not

darkness” (Luke 11:34–35).

6 “Only that yogi who possesses the inner Bliss, who rests on the inner

Foundation, who is one with the inner Light, becomes one with Spirit. He

attains complete liberation in Spirit (even while living in the body)”

(Bhagavad Gita V:24).

7 John 2:19.

8 Luke 10:27.

9 Bhagavad Gita VI:26.

10 The experience of Paramahansa Yogananda here described is spoken of

in the Bhagavad Gita (VI:9): “He is a supreme yogi who regards with

equal-mindedness all men—patrons, friends, enemies, strangers, mediators,

hateful beings, relatives, the virtuous and the ungodly.”

The Desire That Satisfies All Desires

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, October 26, 1939

The glory of God is great. He is real, and He can be found in this life. In

men’s hearts there are many prayers—for money, fame, health—prayers for

all manner of things. But the prayer that should be first in every heart is the

prayer for God’s presence. Silently and surely, as you walk on the path of

life, you must come to the realization that God is the only object, the only

goal that will satisfy you; for in God lies the answer to every desire of the

heart.

When you have found it impossible to fulfill some urgent wish by your own

effort, you turn to God in prayer. Thus every prayer that you utter represents

a desire. But when you find God, all desires vanish, and there is no need for

prayer. I don’t pray. That may seem a strange thing to say, but when the

Object of your prayer is with you all the time, you no longer have need to

pray. In fulfillment of the wish or prayer for Him lies joy eternal.

Material desires come through certain mistaken conceptions about the

purpose of life. This earth is not our home. The scriptures have told us we

are children of God, made in His image, and that it is the will of the Divine

that we return to our Source. What man does not realize is that unless and

until he goes back to the Source, back to God, he will have to struggle to

fulfill endless desires. Reflect on that. Man cannot help having desires, and

it is not a sin to have them; but most human longings hamper fulfillment of

the supreme desire to return to God, hence they are detrimental to man’s

happiness. Until he wants and has God, man will continue to long for

whatever else he believes will make him happy. But to him who has God,

instant fulfillment of all desires comes automatically.

There are two classes of desires: those that help us to find God, and those

that obstruct our finding Him. For example, if someone hits you, you want

to retaliate; but if you overcome that desire by using the superior power of

love, you have applied the action that will help you to find God. All desires

should be satisfied in the divine way. When you try to satisfy them in the

worldly way, you only multiply your difficulties. If you learn to give every

desire to God, He will see to it that your good desires are fulfilled and the

harmful ones are overcome. There is no protection greater than your

conscience, and the divine quality of your good desires. If you but looked at

your soul, the all-perfect reflection of God within you, you would find all

your desires satisfied! In that divine consciousness, having which, no other

gain is greater, you would be unmoved even if the whole world were given

to you; neither would praise elate you, nor blame hurt. You would feel only

the great joy of God within.

God’s Children Should Not Beg

Always seek the guidance of the Divine in trying to fulfill your legitimate

desires, because that is the supreme way to receive the answers to all your

prayers. But one thing you must remember: cut out begging from your

prayer! Change your old attitude of supplication. You should pray to God

intimately, as His child, which you are. God does not object when you pray

from your ego,1 as a stranger and a beggar, but you will find that your

efforts are limited by that consciousness. God does not want you to give up

your own will power, which is your divine birthright as His child.

Naturally, one should distinguish between reasonable and unreasonable

prayers or desires. And bear in mind that, once you have made this

discrimination, whatever good or bad desires you hold on to are bound to be

fulfilled. If you cling to any evil desires, they will be granted; and you will

find out what harm and unhappiness they cause. As time goes on, you will

realize that even though your wish was fulfilled, your heart is still not

satisfied; you will feel something within you rebelling. For example,

suppose you have weak digestion, yet you want to eat fried foods. Not

surprisingly, you suffer every time you do. Although you feel delight while

fulfilling that desire, the aftereffect is pain; thus you are made aware that

you have done wrong. It is wiser to use discrimination to separate your evil

desires from your good ones and, having done so, to avoid the fulfillment of

those wrong desires. Learn to be guided by your conscience, the divine

discriminative power within you.

The Danger of Unfulfilled Desires

Unfulfilled desires remain in the heart. And what is the harm in harboring

them? It is this: Every desire consists of specific forces, either good or evil,

or a mixture of both. And when you die, though your body is gone, those

forces do not die. As mental tabloids they follow your soul wherever it

goes, and when you are reborn, these tabloids manifest as behavioral

tendencies. Thus, a person who has died an alcoholic brings with him the

tendency to alcoholism when he is reborn; and it remains with him until he

overcomes desire for alcohol.

The behavior of even the smallest child reveals certain characteristics of

past lives. Some children have terrible temper tantrums; others are moody.

God did not make them that way. Unfulfilled desires of past lives fashioned

those psychological tendencies; and, because of them, the soul, even though

made in the image of God, appears as something different. If the image of

God within you is distorted in this life by anger or fear, and you do not

conquer such uncharacteristic qualities now, you will be reborn with them;

and you will have the burden of these misery-creating tendencies until you

overcome them in some future incarnation.

It is better, therefore, to work out or overcome all your desires now. They

would be finished immediately and for all time in the supreme joy of God’s

presence; but until you know Him, your unconquered desires will remain to

hound you.

There are two ways of finishing your desires—by realizing, through reason

and discrimination, or wisdom, that only God can give permanent unalloyed

happiness; and by fulfillment. In many cases desires lie hidden within the

subconscious. You think they are finished, but they are not. Life is indeed a

great mystery; but the mystery clears away when you dissect life with the

scalpel of reason. If every day you sit quietly for a little while and analyze

yourself, you will discover that you have many unsatisfied desires. They are

like dangerous germs that you carry through life, and wherever you go, in

this life or the next, they will go with you.

The best course is to do away with all dangerous desires in this life, by

discrimination, and to concentrate on fulfilling your good desires. If you

feel drawn to commit suicide, or to do something evil, get rid of such

desires now. Convince yourself, by reason and by good actions, that you are

a child of God, made in His image, and rise above your moods and bodily

habits. Be more detached. In this way you will conquer. If you suffer from a

chronic ailment, try mentally to separate yourself from the consciousness of

the body. By discrimination you can conquer the senses. Discrimination is

the fire that burns up desire.

It is a general practice to store in the attic all of one’s unwanted,

unnecessary “junk,” and once in a while to have a good housecleaning.

Similarly, hidden away in the attic of your subconscious mind are many

potentially harmful desires that one day may give you great trouble. It is

important, therefore, to analyze yourself. Perhaps you are a hateful or

moody or angry type of person. If so, these stored traits are the result of

your own past behavior. In order to clean out your mental attic of such

unwanted furnishings, you must vigorously employ constructive, positive,

loving action.

Love Thine Enemies

Suppose that even though an old enemy dies, you continue to feel hatred

toward him. In time that bitterness will produce ill effects in your own body

and mind. It is better to concentrate on trying to behold God in your enemy;

for by doing so you release yourself from evil vengeful desires that destroy

your peace of mind. By heaping hatred upon hatred, or giving hate in return

for hate, you not only increase your enemy’s hostility toward you; you

poison your system, physically as well as emotionally, with your own

venom.

Conscience Will Tell You What You Are

Sometimes one feels a desire to “take it easy.” This is not wrong; to get

away from everything now and then gives a person a chance to think what

life is all about. Most people are floating along on the current of custom and

fashion. They have never actually lived their own life; they have lived the

life of the world, and where has it gotten them? So it is wise now and then

to remove yourself from everyday considerations; to calm your mind and

try to understand what kind of person you are and what kind of person you

want to be. And remember, the truest testimony you can find is the

testimony of your own conscience, the discriminative voice of the soul.

Whatever your conscience says, that is what you are. Think of the power of

the conscience of Jesus. His accusers spat upon him and crucified him and

yet he said, “Father, forgive them.” That kind of discrimination is the only

power that will bring light on your path. Whenever there is an

overwhelming desire in your heart to pray for a certain thing, use your

discrimination. Ask yourself, “Is it a good desire or a bad desire for which I

seek fulfillment?”

Man’s Lost Treasure Is God

There are many influences that nourish desire in you. When you see a new

model car, you want one. When you see a new model house, you want one.

Some new style of apparel comes out and immediately you yearn to wear

that fashion. Whence do these desires come? I used to sit for hours

pondering this. Can you classify all your desires? I sorted mine, and kept

only the good ones; and when I had the contact of God, I found all those

good desires at once fulfilled. Today you wish for one thing and tomorrow

you hanker after something else. Your mind, having descended from

almighty God, is not satisfied with the offerings of this world; and it will

never be satisfied, because you have lost your soul’s richest treasure, which

alone can satisfy all your desires, and that is God.

It is true there are some good and necessary desires, and you should strive

to fulfill them. But never forget, while pursuing your little desires, to satisfy

first your supreme desire—for God. Belief in the necessity of fulfilling

lesser desires and duties first is man’s greatest delusion. I well remember

that during my training as a young disciple of my guru, Swami Sri

Yukteswarji, I kept promising myself daily, “I will meditate longer

tomorrow.” A whole year slipped by before I realized that I was still putting

it off. At once I made a resolution that first thing in the morning I would

clean my body and then meditate long. But even then, as soon as I stirred

about I became caught up in my daily duties and activities. Thereupon I

resolved to have my meditation first. Thus I learned a great lesson: First

comes my duty to God, and then I take care of all lesser duties. Why not?

God says, “Why should I open the doors of eternity to you, when you put

other duties before Me?” If you are not soaring to the heights of Spirit, of

what account are you? You have nothing to offer God or man.

So seek Him first. To give more importance to your earthly duties is false

reasoning, because at any moment the angel Gabriel may call you—at any

moment you may be taken away from here. Why then give so much

importance to life? for life is very peculiar. You think you are quite secure.

Suddenly a loved one dies, or you lose your health, and all security

vanishes. How I loved my mother and thought she would be with me

always, and suddenly I found she was gone!2 Don’t be afraid of death, but

be prepared for it.

Life is not what it seems to be. Don’t trust it, for it is very tricky, and full of

disappointments. Perfection was not meant to be found here. I am not

giving you a false picture of life. This is not the kingdom of God; it is God’s

laboratory, where He is testing souls to see if they will overcome evil

desires by good ones, and make Him their supreme desire, so they can

return home to His kingdom.

Take God, Not Life, Seriously

Life is full of tragedy and comedy, a kaleidoscope of infinite variety. No

two things are the same. Everyone’s life is individual. Each person has a

different kind of face, a different kind of mind and desires. We would

become bored if we had exactly the same experiences every day; we would

soon tire of life. Were heaven itself the same every day, we wouldn’t want

it. We enjoy variety. The stereotyped conception of heaven is all wrong. If it

were boring, all the saints would pray to come back to earth for a little

change! Heaven is something infinitely different, ever pleasantly new,

whereas earth is often unpleasantly new!

Yet, no matter how trying life is, most people become accustomed to it and

assume there is no other way to live. Not being able to compare this life

with the spiritual life, they do not realize how painful and boring earthly

living is.

Actually, life is not real; it is only an entertainment. And just as old movies

are shown over and over, so basically the same old incidents occur and

recur in life. And although life will go on eternally, the same themes

depicted in past films will be portrayed again and again. It is true that

history repeats itself. We are all museum pieces!

Whatever comes in life, just take it joyfully, impersonally, as you would a

motion picture. Life is entertaining when we do not take it too seriously. A

good laugh is an excellent remedy for human ills. One of the best

characteristics of the American people is their ability to laugh. To be able to

laugh at life is marvelous. This my master [Swami Sri Yukteswar] taught

me. In the beginning of my training in his hermitage, I went about with a

solemn face, never smiling. One day Master pointedly remarked, “What is

this? Are you attending a funeral ceremony? Don’t you know that finding

God is the funeral of all sorrows? Then why so glum? Don’t take this life

too seriously.” He taught me that one must be mentally above every

crucifixion of earthly experience in order to find complete happiness in

God.

Krishna taught: “Evenminded during happiness and sorrow, profit and loss,

triumph and failure—so encounter the battle of life! Thus thou wilt not

acquire sin.”3 To remain evenminded, no matter what comes, is one of the

best ways to conquer delusive desires. This I learned from the example of

my great Master—even to the last, changeless. Christ also demonstrated

that spirit. Even though Jesus was tortured, God’s love was not taken away;

he did not lose his divine consciousness. God’s protection of our joy and

peace is the greatest fortress possible. Throughout all trials and sufferings,

remember the good things that God has given you. Your soul is a divine

temple of God. The darkness of mortal ignorance and limitations must be

driven out of that temple. It is wonderful to be in the consciousness of the

soul—fortified, strong!

Be afraid of nothing. Hating none, giving love to all, feeling the love of

God, seeing His presence in everyone, and having but one desire—for His

constant presence in the temple of your consciousness—that is the way to

live in this world. Those who have other desires will not know true

satisfaction.

Environment Shapes Our Desires

Desires are formed according to one’s environment; they are created by, and

therefore limited by, your sense perceptions. Attending a country fair

satisfies a desire for a little excitement; but after you have been to a world

fair and viewed all the different exhibits, a small fair no longer holds any

attraction. This illustrates the importance of having communion with God

now, for the comparison with inferior earthly joys; then your desires will be

of a much higher and more advanced nature. The desire to be one with God

is the greatest of all. When you are through with any lesser desire, you soon

pick up another, but when you have God, all other desires are satisfied

completely. “Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and

all these things shall be added unto you.”4 Why not fulfill first this highest

desire? for when He answers your prayer to know Him, all other desires

will be instantly fulfilled throughout eternity.

Perhaps you feel that you have no desires. Well, I have often noticed what

happens when people go shopping. They may have no particular desire to

buy, but suddenly something catches their eye and they think, “I must have

it!” Day and night that object is on their mind, and finally they buy it, even

if they have to borrow the money. Then, after having it for a while, their

happiness in it grows stale, and they want something else. We meet people

who say, “If only I could have a thousand dollars (or a car, or a swimming

pool),” and when that wish is satisfied, they yearn for something different.

Human desires are not perfect, hence their fulfillment does not lead to

perfect happiness.

The world environment will try to prevent you from remembering that the

only worthwhile desire is to have God. But every day you should remind

yourself of this. And when you have made up your mind not to smoke, or

eat unwisely, or lie or cheat, be firm in these good desires; don’t weaken.

Wrong environment saps your will and invites wrong desires. Live with

thieves and you think that is the only life. But live with divine persons, and

after having divine communion, no other desires can tempt you. All become

stale. Therefore even a few moments of deep meditation, or the company of

a saint, will be a raft of inspiration to carry you across this ocean of

delusion to the shores of God.

Be Safe in the Castle of God’s Presence

Joy lies in continually thinking of God. The longing for Him should be

constant. A time comes when your mind never wanders away, when not

even the greatest affliction of body, mind, and soul can take your

consciousness from the living presence of God. Is that not wonderful? to

live and think and feel God all the time? to remain in the castle of His

presence, whence death nor aught else can take you away? “On Me fix thy

mind, be thou My devotee, with ceaseless worship bow reverently before

Me. Having thus united thyself to Me as thy Highest Goal, thou shalt be

Mine own.”5 When you are proof against all desires, you are enjoying the

Presence Eternal.

This life is strange. Everything is subject to change. That is why one should

not anchor his happiness on this life. Our time will pass on; what you are

seeing now will be gone one day. Change is good if you don’t let it hurt

you. When it does hurt, the rebellion you feel is meant to show you that you

should not have any desires. When you are anchored in that great Spirit you

are enjoying everything, but without attachment. Therefore it is worthwhile

to make the effort to know Him. Otherwise life can horribly disillusion you.

When I went back to India in 1935, I was looking forward to visiting some

of the places I had enjoyed as a child, but upon my arrival I saw everything

had changed. The stage was differently set. The greatest disillusionment

came to me when I visited my old home in Ichapur, where I used to play

and watch the birds. I was shocked. Only one remembered tree was left.

That is the way life is; one by one, things familiar and dear vanish from our

sight. I would have given anything then to have seen our home as it was in

my childhood. Nevertheless I did see it later, materialized in a vision; we

swam in the pond, and I went upstairs in the house and lay on the bed and

ate mangoes, as I had done so many years before.

Scrutinize your desires carefully now. Sort them and keep only good ones;

and let not even those good desires choke off the one important desire, for

God. That must not be stifled. You are in great delusion when you ask God

for fulfillment of your earthly desires and never ask Him to make a gift of

Himself to you. What would you think of a son who says, “Mother, write a

check for me,” whenever he wants anything, but otherwise gives no thought

to her? Don’t be like that; never be ungrateful.

When this book of life shall be closed, there will remain with you only the

realization gained from those desires you have fulfilled in connection with

God. So read from Whispers6 and then meditate before you go to bed each

night. When you wake up, think of God. Pray not only before taking food,

but when you are eating, and afterward. When you are working, weave the

thought of God around that activity. When you are in touch with God, you

will see all your desires mysteriously fulfilled. But you must seek Him first.

He has given you everything; but only if you forsake all His gifts,

preferring Him, will He surrender Himself. When you show God that you

are willing to sacrifice everything to know Him, He will come to you.

Carry a Portable Heaven Within

The hardest obstacle to overcome is yourself. When you sit to meditate at

night, your nervousness and restlessness are still with you. Learn to control

your mind and body. Be king of yourself. Carry within you a portable

heaven, and in life or in death, in heaven or in hades, that inner heaven will

be with you. Pray deeply, sincerely, “O God, I yearn to know You. You

must answer me!” and next morning pray again, “Lord, You must come to

me!” and pray again the next night in the same way, in the language of your

heart; if you keep on, He must respond. But when you pray halfheartedly,

while thinking in the back of your mind about something else, He knows

He is not first with you, and He does not respond.

Have God first. Have God now. Don’t wait, because delusion is very strong.

Before you know it, the time will have come for you to quit this world.

Whenever you have a moment, sit down and meditate. No matter how many

times your prayers have not been answered, don’t worry; keep on praying.

Pray with sincerity. Believe that your prayer is answered.

In my life I have seen the most wonderful demonstrations of God’s

response to prayer. I urge you to pray not for little things, but for His

presence. Only that prayer is worthwhile. If you are willing to sacrifice an

hour or two of sleep for meditation every night, you will enter the kingdom

of God. Don’t watch the time. With deep sincerity pray, “Lord, I want You

alone.” Bad habits and restlessness will try to shake you from your effort,

but keep your mind on God and you will find His presence with you.

Desires for worldly joys create the magnetic attraction that draws man back

to earth, life after life. Reincarnation is no longer necessary for those who

have fulfilled their desires in God. Whenever they want to fulfill any wish,

they simply think of that object and it is materialized before them. My

mother appeared before me in flesh and blood, just as I see you here. How

kind is God, how marvelous is God! that He materializes the objects of our

desires to show us His love and gratefulness when we have given Him first

place in our hearts.

To be able to demonstrate health or wealth or power or friends with God’s

help is fine, but if you can coax God Himself to respond to your prayers,

you are a man of destiny. So don’t rest until you demonstrate God in your

life. He will give you everything you ever wished for; and He will test you.

The tests in the spiritual life are greater than in any other. But you who pass

His tests shall say: “Lord, my greatest prayer has been answered. What else

could my heart want or need, but You?”

1 The ego consciousness; identification with the mortal body, which creates

a feeling of separateness from God, and hence a feeling of limitation.

2 Paramahansa Yogananda was not yet eleven when his mother died.

(Publisher’s Note)

3 Bhagavad Gita II:38.

4 Matthew 6:33.

5 Bhagavad Gita IX:34.

6 Whispers from Eternity, a book of spiritualized prayers by Paramahansa

Yogananda. A spiritualized prayer is one to which God has responded. Any

devotee praying deeply and sincerely to Him in those same words will

receive a similar blessing. (Publisher’s Note)

In God Is All Happiness

Self-Realization Fellowship Hermitage, Encinitas, California, June 10, 1937

God in His infinite mercy gives to us His joy, His inspiration, true life, true

wisdom, true happiness, and true understanding through all the various

experiences of our lives. But the glory of God is revealed only in the

quietness of the soul, in the intensity of the inner effort of the mind to

commune with Him. It is there that we find truth. Outside, delusion is very

strong; very few people can get away from the influences of outer

environment. The world goes on with its infinite complexities and diverse

experiences. Each life is new and each life has to be lived differently. Yet

underlying all life is the silent voice of God, ever calling to us through

flowers, through scriptures, and through our conscience—through all things

that are beautiful and that make life worth living.

The more you concentrate on the outside, the less you will know of the

inner glory of the everlasting joy of Spirit. The more you concentrate

within, the less you will have of difficulties without. But most people do not

understand this truth because of the influence of worldly company and

environment, and bad habits. Environment keeps you more or less

engrossed; it never allows you to think of deeper realities. Even in this

beautiful place in Encinitas I have seen that some students came without the

pure intention of seeking spiritual development. If you choose to see God

you can see Him everywhere. Habits are predatory; they destroy. You

should learn to be happy with what you have. Don’t wish for anything more

than what is already coming to you. The Father knows what you need.

The best way to be unendingly happy is to be conscious of the Father. Your

paramount desire should be God-realization; the determination to be with

Him should be supreme in your consciousness.

I have given everything to God. There is nothing else that I can give

anymore. And I have already realized that the only purpose of life is to

know God. Many people may doubt that finding God is the purpose of life;

but everyone can accept the idea that the purpose of life is to find

happiness. I say that God is Happiness. He is Bliss. He is Love. He is Joy

that will never go away from your soul. So why shouldn’t you try to acquire

that Happiness? No one else can give it to you. You must continuously

cultivate it yourself. The forces of nature are constantly trying to give you

the pleasures of the world, but such transitory satisfactions only end in

sorrow and bitterness. Even the most favored person, one who appears to

have everything, may not be happy. And you will never be satisfied for long

with earthly things. They give only a false peace and contentment. The

whole world has been plunged into chaos through greedy desires. Greed is

creating war. Nothing else is causing it.

He who conquers himself is the greatest victor in this battle of life. Money,

fame, desires—everything that goes against this ideal is a detriment to our

peace and happiness. If people would only learn to concentrate on the real

values of life, they would find true happiness; but they are carried away by

earthly desires. I find that no temptation can make me deviate from the path

I have chosen. I could enthrall thousands with the powers God has given

me, but that course would be a detriment to me, and in any case I do not

seek to enthrall thousands. I love to see true devotees—those who are

anchored in God. Souls who love God will come here, and those whose

enthusiasm will last to the end of life will find Him.

God Must Come to Those Who Truly Want Him

It is impossible to deceive the Lord because He is sitting right behind your

thoughts, and knows what you are thinking and desiring. If in your heart

you truly renounce the world and seek inner communion with Him, He will

come to you. But you must know that you want Him and nothing else. Once

that desire for Him is established in your heart, He must come.

The only thing to live for is the contact of the Divine, the communion with

God. That is why Jesus said, “The harvest truly is plenteous but the laborers

are few.”1 Believe the words of Jesus, who lived truth. Has there ever been

a greater example of godliness for us than when he said, “Father, forgive

them, for they know not what they do”?2

Everybody wants to have more money than the next person, and when he

has it he is not satisfied, because he finds there is still someone else who

has more than he. People live in a bedlam of misery, created by their own

desires. Learn to be satisfied with what you have. The average person in

America has much more than the average person in Europe or India, or in

any other land. But still he is not happy! He is burning with anxieties and

worries.

God’s way is the easiest way. It is best to go to the Father first and ask Him

what is best for you. When you know that He is, and that He awaits you,

why should you waste your time on lesser things? Have you ever tried

sincerely to see if the Father talks to you or not? The Lord is speaking to all

human beings. What more can He do to attract your attention?

I don’t want people to think that they can attain realization simply by

listening to others or by reading books. They must practice what they read

and hear. It is better to go to church than to stay at home and listen to idle

chatter, but even in church you must feel Him within, and you must know

the technique by which you can realize His presence. Emotionalism and

intellectualism cannot give realization.

When you resign yourself completely to God, when you are never tempted

to pray for selfish ends, and when you are sure that God is your spirit, that

He is your soul and everything else—then you are free.

Think! A few decades hence, this existence of ours will have become a

dream; and my sitting here and talking with you will have become part of

that dream. All the great masters of the past have become dreams in the

consciousness of mankind. But those great ones have attained. They are

always conscious of what is going on.

What a dream this life is! And yet, when you look at your body now and see

how it throbs with life, you become fully convinced again of the reality of

this dream. You think you must have this or that and then you can be happy.

But no matter how many of your desires are satisfied, you will never find

happiness through them. The more you have, the more you want. Learn to

live simply. “His mind is full with contentment whose desires ever flow

inward. That man is like a changeless ocean which is kept brimful with

constantly entering waters. He is not a muni who bores holes of desires in

his reservoir of peace and lets the waters escape.”3

Seek God in Solitude

You need to be guided by those who know God, those who commune with

Him. Jesus taught us to seek God in solitude.4 In the solitude of inner

silence you learn about the Holy Ghost. The great masters of India also

speak of this divine power. The true meaning of the Holy Ghost has first

come in this land through Self-Realization Fellowship. Everything in

creation is vibration, which is guided by the intelligence of God. That

intelligent vibration is the Holy Ghost.5 Everyone should learn how to

contact the Holy Ghost through meditation; Self-Realization teaches you

how.

In the silence of your soul, in the bower of your concentration, the romance

with the Infinite is endless. But you cannot have God and mammon6

together. You must give yourself to God wholly. He is the Eternal Lover,

and He is begging for the love of you all.

You must learn to use your will and concentration in order to seek God

wholeheartedly. Your actions are dictated by your habits. You are always

being forced by habits to do things that you don’t want to do. You are your

own enemy and you don’t know it. You don’t learn to sit quietly. You don’t

learn to give time to God. And you are impatient and expect to attain

heaven all at once. You cannot get it by reading books or by listening to

sermons or by doing charitable works. You can get God only by giving your

time to Him in deep meditation.

Look to God Alone

You must make the effort to please God first. It is impossible to please all. I

try never to displease anybody. I do my best and that is all I can do. My first

aim is to please God. I use my hands to pray in adoration before Him, my

feet to seek Him everywhere, my mind to think of Him as always present.

Every throne of thought must be occupied by God—God as peace, God as

love, God as kindness, God as understanding, God as compassion, God as

wisdom. This is the only thing that I have come to tell you. Naught else.

Learn the Self-Realization technique of meditation. Keep good company.

Don’t look to others, but to God alone. And every day speak of this work to

others. Every day do good to some people. As long as there is money in my

pocket I never cease to give. My bank is God.

Last of all, you must know God, just as the great ones know Him. If you

follow the technique, you will find Him through your own efforts.

One day I was walking outside the hermitage, thinking of my great guru, Sri

Yukteswarji, and wondering about him. I felt sad that I was enjoying this

beautiful ashram and that he could not be here to share it with me. Suddenly

he appeared to me in the sky and said, “You think you are the only one

enjoying this place! I am enjoying it from all space.”

You must strive to be one with God. Practice meditation every day and

learn to love Him deeply, and to love your neighbors as yourself. This is the

only way to avoid war. There must be spiritual cooperation. Without

spirituality there cannot be happiness, either national or individual. And

happiness must start with the individual. God-communion is the only

answer to all problems, whether they be physical, financial, matrimonial,

moral, or spiritual.

Happiness comes by feeling that you are one with God—that you are the

child of God—a prince child of the King of the Universe. You are not a

beggar child. You have jailed yourself in the body because of ignorance of

your Father. You must free yourself from this jail. You must keep your mind

riveted to God no matter what comes. Then you will find great peace and

joy. “Their thoughts fully on Me, their beings surrendered to Me,

enlightening one another, proclaiming Me always, My devotees are

contented and joyful.”7

1 Matthew 9:37.

2 Luke 23:34.

3 Bhagavad Gita II:70. The true muni is a monk who observes spiritual

silence (mauna), by controlling the waves of thoughts and feelings that are

ceaselessly in motion during ordinary consciousness.

4 “But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet (the inner silence of

meditation), and when thou hast shut thy door (to the noisy senses), pray to

thy Father which is in secret (within you); and thy Father which seeth in

secret shall reward thee openly” (Matthew 6:6).

5 The outward, active manifestation of the omnipresent Christ

Consciousness, its “witness” in creation (Revelation 3:14). Holy Ghost is

also referred to in the Bible as “the Word” (John 1:1) and “the Comforter”

(John 14:26), and in Hindu scriptures as “Aum.” This invisible divine

power is the only doer, the sole causative and activating force that upholds

all creation through vibration. Through a special yoga meditation technique,

taught by Self-Realization Fellowship, the adept communes with the Holy

Ghost, the blissful Comforter: “The Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost,

whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and

bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you”

(John 14:26).

6 Matthew 6:24.

7 Bhagavad Gita X:9.

How to Be More Likable

First Self-Realization Fellowship Temple at Encinitas, California, August

20, 1939

Some persons are born with a likable nature; everyone is attracted to them.

Some are never liked. Others are neither liked nor disliked; they are just

ignored. Why? Impartial God is not responsible for the uneven distribution

of attractive qualities. The differences in each man’s character are of his

own cultivation. He himself has created those pleasant or unpleasant

qualities, in this or in past lives. It would be a great injustice if God were

responsible for starting off some children with the advantage of likable

good qualities and others with a handicap of obnoxious bad qualities. But it

is not He who has established bad tendencies in some children and good in

others; therefore we cannot hold God accountable.

God creates all men equal, made in His image. In order to see the

justification of man’s seeming inequalities, we must understand the law of

reincarnation. Knowledge of this law was buried and forgotten during the

Dark Ages. Jesus spoke of reincarnation when he said: “Elias is come

already, and they knew him not....Then the disciples understood that he

spake unto them of John the Baptist.”1 The soul appearing in one

incarnation as Elias (Elijah) had returned in another incarnation as John the

Baptist.

There would be no meaning to life if it did not afford us sufficient

opportunities to develop our potentials and satisfy our desires. Without

reincarnation, how does the divine justice operate for those souls who have

no chance to express themselves because they are encased in the body of a

baby that is born dead, or of one that perhaps lives only to the age of six?

Those souls could hardly be condemned to Hades, because they have done

nothing to deserve punishment; nor could they go to Heaven, having had no

opportunity to earn it. The answer is that this earth is a vast schoolhouse,

and the law of reincarnation is the justice that brings each man here again

and again until he has learned all of life’s lessons. Lord Krishna referred to

this truth: “By diligently following his path, the yogi, perfected by the

efforts of many births, is purged of sin (karmic taint) and finally enters the

Supreme Beatitude.”2

Man himself has cultivated his bright and dark qualities. Somewhere,

sometime, in this or other lives, the seeds were planted by his own actions.

If he permits the seeds of harmful acts to grow, they will crowd out the

seeds of good that he has sown. The wise cast out the seeds of evil from the

garden of life.

Attractiveness Comes From Within

One should learn to analyze himself and others to determine why some

persons are liked by all and others are not. Even among children we find

some whom everyone regards affectionately and others whom everyone

avoids. One of the first conclusions from such analysis is that if a person is

to become likable, he must make himself more attractive from within.

Sometimes even the most physically attractive person may be repellent

because of the inner ugliness reflected in his speech and actions.

At one time the secret of popularity was supposed to be “it,” a kind of

physical appeal and magnetism. But having “it” does not necessarily make

one likable. Our good or bad traits determine whether, and by whom, we are

liked or disliked. Evil attracts evil; good attracts good. “It” is not what we

should want, but the kind of magnetism that will draw good to us, that will

bring sincere friends and merited admiration. Can externals such as clothes

and a pretty or handsome face give us this kind of attractiveness? No. It has

to be created within.

Avoid moodiness. There is no unpleasantness in being grave; but your

expression is quite different when you are indulging in a dark mood. Your

face is a mirror that reveals every change of feeling. Your thoughts and

emotions, like waves, ebb and flow in the facial muscles, continuously

altering your appearance. Everyone you meet sees and reacts to these facial

expressions of what you are inwardly thinking and feeling. You can fairly

well control your eyes and your smile, and thus conceal your feelings from

some; but not from all. Lincoln rightly said, “It is true that you may fool all

the people some of the time; you can even fool some of the people all the

time; but you can’t fool all of the people all the time.”

In our eyes is the entire history of our life. It cannot be concealed from

those who know how to read it. There are spiritual eyes, half-spiritual eyes,

dishonest eyes, sensual eyes. What one does is written there. If I were to

analyze what I see in a person’s eyes, he would be astonished at my

accuracy.

Never do anything that taints your mind. Wrong actions cause negative or

evil mental vibrations that are reflected in your whole appearance and

personality. Engage in those actions and thoughts that nurture the good

qualities you want to have. If you conduct yourself in accord with the truths

I am telling you, you will find your life beautifully different.

You Are Judged Largely by the Way You Conduct Yourself

One is judged somewhat by his dress, but largely by the way he conducts

himself. Always be clean and trim in appearance. Avoid overdressing: fussy

clothes and accessories make one look like a museum piece! Clothe

yourself simply and neatly, and as befits your personality. But first of all

learn good behavior. Once you have developed your mind and cultivated

appealing inner virtues, dress becomes less important.

Mahatma Gandhi has proved that clothes alone do not “make the man.” He

wears3 only a loincloth, by way of identifying himself with the simple

masses of India. There he once arrived thus clad for a party that was being

given by an English governor. The servants would not let him in. He

returned home and sent a package by messenger to the governor. It

contained a suit. The governor called him at his home and asked the

meaning of the package. The great man replied: “I was invited to your

party, but I wasn’t allowed entrance because of my dress; therefore I have

sent my suit instead.” The governor of course insisted that he come. Even in

London Gandhi went to call on the King and Queen of England clad only in

his loincloth. He had transcended the clothes personality. Now I am not

recommending this mode of dress! Gandhi has a mission to fulfill, and this

is a part of his role. If one becomes as great as Gandhi, he also may do as he

sees fit.

The point is, one should not think all the time about the body; nor should he

be careless of it. To give the body too little or too much attention makes one

become unbalanced, fanatical. Look after the body in a reasonable way, and

remember always what is most important—your mentality, your behavior.

Give more attention to the mind, the springboard of your behavior, for that

is what most persons respond to.

When With Others, Be Sincere and Thoughtful

Be interested in others. When you are by yourself you have a right to think

and do what you want to; but when you are with others, you should not be

absentminded or uninterested. The company of a corpse would be

preferable to that of an absentminded person; the indifference of a corpse

bears no insult. When you are in the company of others, be with them

wholeheartedly; but when your interest in being with them lags, make a

polite excuse and withdraw. You have no right to remain while your mind is

absent.

Be genuinely amiable when you are with others. Never be a “sourpuss.”

You don’t have to laugh boisterously, like a hyena, but don’t wear a long

face either. Just be smiling, congenial, and kind. Smiling on the outside

when you are angry or resentful inside, however, is hypocrisy. If you want

to be likable, be sincere. Sincerity is a soul quality that God has given to

every human being, but not all express it. Above all, be humble. Though

you may have admirable inner strength, don’t overwhelm others with your

strong nature. Be calm and considerate of them. This is the way to develop

likable magnetism.

Strive always to be understanding. Some people choose to be quarrelsome

and to misunderstand us no matter what we say or do. They go about with a

chip on their shoulder. To draw real friends, one must cultivate

understanding. True friends understand one another no matter what they do.

You should be like that.

What is life unless you have the right kind of friends around you? There is a

magnet in your heart that will attract true friends. That magnet is

unselfishness, thinking of others first. Very few persons are free from self-

centeredness. Yet one can develop the quality of unselfishness very easily if

he practices thinking of others first. A mother usually has this quality. Her

life is service. She gives to her husband and children first. Because she

always thinks of others before herself, others think of her. That is the

tradition in the homes in India. We are taught the same spirit in the ashrams

of real spiritual teachers.

Consideration for others is a most wonderful quality. It is the greatest

attractiveness you can have. Practice it! If someone is thirsty, a thoughtful

person anticipates his need and offers him a drink. Consideration means

awareness of and attentiveness to others. A considerate person, when in the

company of others, will have an intuitive awareness of their needs.

Live for Others and They Will Live for You

There are those who would say, “I am a devout man.” Yet if someone else

sat in their church pew they would be ready to take off the intruder’s head!

Once in a while I see this sort of incident in my classes. If another person

wants your seat, give it, even though you must stand. By your exemplary

behavior you will have someone else thinking considerately of you every

day. When you learn to live for others, they will live for you. When you live

for yourself, no one is interested in you. You can best attract others by your

good actions.

If you look around you, when you attend a party; you will almost always

notice some guests who are openly envious of what others have. No one

wants to be with thoughtless, selfish people. But everyone is glad to be with

a tactful, considerate person.

Practice consideration in your speech as well as in your actions; and when

you feel tempted to speak harshly, control that impulse and talk calmly

instead. Let no one hear harsh words from you. Be not afraid to speak truth

when you are asked to do so; but do not force your thoughts on others.

Remember also, it may be truth to speak of the blind man as a blind man, or

the sick man as a sick man, but it is better to avoid such bluntness. By the

kindness and consideration of your speech you help to uplift others and

make them better.

It isn’t always your words that others listen to, however, but the strength

and sincerity behind them. When a sincere man speaks, the world moves.

When he says something, others listen. Some persons talk on and on,

hoping to convince the hearer by the steady barrage of words. But the

captive listener is only thinking, “Please let me go!” When you talk, don’t

talk too much about yourself. Try to speak on a subject that interests the

other person. And listen. That is the way to be attractive. You will see how

your presence is in demand.

My mother was considerate in that way. Fathers and mothers should never

talk against one another to the children. They should keep their troubles

completely to themselves. My parents had that self-control; they were really

like gods. Only once did I see trouble between my father and mother. All

that we children knew was that a carriage was at the door and our mother

was going away. Uncle came in and asked Father, “What is the matter?”

Father said, “I have no objection to her spending money for her charities; I

only ask that she not spend beyond my income.” Uncle whispered

something in Father’s ear. After a few conciliatory words from Father,

Mother sent the carriage away. She never said a word against Father. She

was always thinking of others.

It is a joy to live for others. When I am alone I have hardly any impulse to

eat, but when I am with others I like to fix appetizing dishes for them. I saw

that same characteristic in my guru, Swami Sri Yukteswarji. During my first

visits to his ashram, I gained the impression that he always had savory food

to eat. But once I went there when he didn’t expect me, and I saw he was

having the plainest meal imaginable. I questioned him about it. “I don’t

have special dishes except when you come,” he replied. “I like to prepare

them for you.”

Once a fellow college student accompanied me to the market to buy some

pineapples. There were only two; one was larger than the other. I bought

both of them and handed the large one to my friend. He was so surprised!

He thought I had intended to keep that one for myself. A wonderful feeling

arises within a person when he is considerate of others, thinking first of

them. As soon as you are concerned for someone else, not only does he

think of you, but God thinks of you too. If you are thoughtful, doing for

others all the time, then even if you part with your last penny to help them,

God will return even more blessings to you.

Another thing to remember: Each one of you has some special quality, a

uniqueness, that others have not. Also, each one is richer or poorer in some

way than others are. If you are unselfish, good-tempered, understanding,

you are richer than those who are selfish and angry and jealous.

Perfect Balance Is the Altar of God

Mankind is like a large zoo—so many people behaving so differently, most

of them having no real control over themselves. But before one can realize

the true Goal of life, he has to have that self-control. He must seek balance.

Perfect balance is the altar of God. Strive for this; and once you have

attained it, never lose it. Christ did not lose it when he was being nailed to

the cross. He said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

The ordinary person cannot bear his tests.

When I started on the spiritual path I supposed that only good would

happen to me; but I found that many difficult experiences also came. Then I

reasoned: “Because I love God so deeply, I have expected too much from

Him. From now on I will say, ‘Lord, let Thy will be done.’” Severe trials

came. But I held to the thought, “Let Thy will be done.” I wanted to accept

whatever He sent my way. And He always showed me how to be victorious

in every test.

Even death is nothing to the spiritually strong. I once dreamed I was dying.

Nevertheless I was praying to Him: “Lord it is all right; whatever is Thy

will.” Then He touched me and I realized the truth: “How can I die? The

wave cannot die; it sinks back into the ocean and comes forth again. The

wave never dies; and I can never die.”

When you go to a clothing store, you try to find a garment that is suited to

you, that brings out the best in you. You should do the same for your soul.

The soul has no particular apparel; it can don any style it wants to. The

body is limited, but the soul can put on any kind of mental dress, any kind

of personality.

If you think deeply about any person, study his history, and consciously

imitate his personality, you will begin to be like him; you will establish

your identity with that personality. I have practiced this, and I can take on

any personality I wish. When I put on the personality of wisdom I can talk

of nothing but wisdom. When I adopt the personality of Sri Chaitanya,4 a

great devotee of God, I can speak of nothing but devotion. And when I

attune myself to the personality of Jesus, I cannot speak of God as Mother

—only as the Father, as he did. The soul can adopt any mental dress it

admires or desires, and change that dress as often as it pleases.

When you meet a wonderful person, don’t you wish you were like him?

Think of all the noble qualities that are in the hearts of great men and

women; you can have them all in your own heart. You can be humble and

strong, or brave like a general fighting for a righteous cause. You can have

the conquering will of Genghis Khan or the divine will and love and

surrender of St. Francis.

Seek God, and Be Victorious in Life

Above all, develop the will to seek God, no matter what the obstacles. Then

you will be victorious in life. When I am trying to do something for the

work, and many trials come, I sometimes think: “Why should I have to go

through this? I have found God. I don’t need these things for myself.”5 But

then I tell Him: “I will accept whatever comes to me. I care not what people

think of me, because one day they are with me, the next day they are against

me. Your pleasure is my pleasure. Your assurance is my assurance.”

Emulate the consciousness of the great ones such as Christ. Realize his

omnipresence. The Father gave Jesus that universal consciousness by which

he knows all things. Even as I am talking, he knows what I am saying.

Though you don’t see him, I see him. He is right here—a great light,

transforming this temple. Everyone here is within that light which I see. We

are like waves in the ocean of that light—the light of Christ Consciousness,

the light of God. When you see His light and His presence, then you know

that this life is nothing more than a test that everyone must go through to

reach God. If Satan’s tests are conquered, then even Satan becomes the tool

of God. Every trial is a blessing if it brings us nearer to God. This is what

you should remember. And whatever you do on earth, do it for God.

Each human being is unique; no two can be exactly the same. Think of

yourself this way: “My personality is the gift of God. What I am, no one

else is. I shall be very proud of my divine individuality. I shall improve

myself and don a personality of goodness.” If you play your part well, you

are just as good as the soul who plays the part of a king or queen. And so

long as you play your part well, you will be attractive and loved by all. Your

part well played is your passport to God.

Abraham Lincoln was an accomplished actor on this stage of life. He was

not afraid to play his difficult role. He was working for God and for what he

believed to be right: the equality of man. That is why he is remembered and

loved today. If you strive to serve God, you have served everyone. Seek to

please Him, not man.

What you expect others to be, you be first. Practice these suggestions. Take

one quality at a time and work at developing it. From today, for instance,

practice peace. Then take cheerfulness; try to smile even when you are

unhappy. Then work at cultivating courage and fearlessness. Some persons

are terrified of the dark. If you are one of these, practice going into a dark

room until you get over this fear. Develop the consciousness that God is

with you. You can be in an impregnable castle and still disease can get at

you there. Yet you can be on the battlefield with bullets flying all around

you, and if your time to leave the body has not come, nothing will hurt you.

Practice perfecting sincerity, unselfishness, business ability, and so on.

Work at it like the strong-minded martyr who never compromises his ideals.

No matter what comes, do not let it bother or deter you. Be like that.

Practice consideration and goodness until you are like a beautiful flower

that everyone loves to see. Be the beauty that is in a flower, and the

attractiveness that is in a pure mind. When you are attractive in that way,

you will always have true friends. You will be loved by both man and God.

1 Matthew 17:12–13.

2 Bhagavad Gita VI:45.

3 Gandhi was still living when Paramahansaji gave this talk. (Publisher’s

Note)

4 Sri Chaitanya’s fame as a bhakta (devotee of God) spread throughout

India in the 16th century. When in Gaya, in 1508, he had a spiritual

awakening and became inflamed with love for God, whom he worshiped as

the avatar Lord Krishna.

5 In the Bhagavad Gita, III:1, the devotee Arjuna similarly lamented to the

Lord: “If Thou dost consider understanding [realization of truth] to be

superior to action, why then dost Thou enjoin on me this awful activity?”

And when facing his test on the cross, Jesus cried to God: “If it be possible,

let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou wilt”

(Matthew 26:39).

At Mahatma Gandhi’s Ashram in Wardha

Sri Yogananda is reading a note that Gandhi (right) has just written (it was a

Monday, the Mahatma’s day for observing silence). On the following day,

August 27, 1935, at Gandhiji’s request, Sri Yogananda initiated him in

Kriya Yoga.

SRF Lake Shrine and Gandhi World Peace Memorial

Each year thousands of people from all over the world enjoy the tranquil

beauty of this scenic location in Pacific Palisades, California. On the

grounds, set amid verdant hillsides and flower gardens, are a hand-carved

stone sarcophagus that enshrines a portion of Mahatma Gandhi’s ashes, and

a chapel where Self-Realization Fellowship services, meditations, and

classes are held weekly. The photo above shows a portion of the crowd in

attendance when Paramahansa Yogananda dedicated the ten-acre Lake

Shrine on August 20, 1950.

Developing Personality

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, October 28, 1938

Personality and its development are generally considered only in the light of

realizing some material goal, such as increasing one’s business or social

opportunities. The real nature of personality is rarely analyzed.

What, essentially, is personality? It is the ego consciousness; not ego in the

sense of inflated pride, but as the consciousness of existence. Each one of

us knows: “I exist.”

Further, we are conscious of existing in a certain way, as a man or a woman,

and with certain characteristic qualities. We think about ourselves in terms

of our individual background, experiences, and environment. A

housekeeper thinks of herself as a housekeeper, a lecturer thinks of himself

as a lecturer, a scientist thinks of himself as a scientist. Yet when they are

asleep they forget their daytime activities. In sleep the consciousness of

existence remains, though the egoistic concept of the wakeful personality

may fade away entirely. But as soon as one awakens he remembers and

becomes reassociated with his environmental identity. Therefore the

personality a man displays in his wakeful hours is merely a cultivated and

partial individuality.

The consciousness of existence is fundamentally a universal, unlimited

state; but it becomes more or less bound by the personality traits that we

hold to from day to day. Eventually we forget that our individual qualities

can be expanded or contracted, according to our behavior.

Whence does our true personality derive? It comes from God. He is

Absolute Consciousness, Absolute Existence, and Absolute Bliss. The

Creator knows that He exists; He also knows that His existence is eternal,

and that His nature is ever new Bliss.

With the human mind we cannot know the Infinite Mind or perceive what

ineffable Spirit is; but through the superconsciousness of the soul we can

taste the Divine Presence as Bliss. The joy we receive from any experience

flows from God, even though it may have been roused by some outward

circumstance.

By concentrating within, you can directly feel the divine bliss of your soul

within and also without. If you can stabilize yourself in that consciousness,

your outer personality will develop and become attractive to all beings. The

soul is made in God’s image, and when we become established in soul

awareness, our personality begins to reflect His goodness and beauty. That

is your real personality. Any other characteristics you display are more or

less a graft—they are not the real “you.” The divine man, living in the

cosmic consciousness of God, can assume any kind of outer personality he

wishes.

When I am conscious of my human personality I have limitations, but as

soon as I change my consciousness to the soul sphere I see everything just

as if it were a motion picture. A person concentrating on the beam by which

images are shown on a movie screen can see that all those figures are

scintillating by the current of light emanating from the projector. In the

same way, I see the world and all its creatures solely as the projected

thoughts of God. Concentrate on matter and you see everything in terms of

matter. But as soon as you lift up your consciousness to the state of divine

awareness, you see the oceanic current of God’s light flowing behind all

matter. You see everything in terms of Spirit.

Though the unity of God is reflected in everything, it appears diversified in

cosmic nature. His creative life flows throughout the earth; put a seed in the

ground and it begins to grow. Metals express a certain power and beauty of

God. In the vegetable kingdom He changes His personality again; the active

expression of life is more visible in plants. Still, a study of creation reveals

that every metal, every plant, every animal has a distinctive personality; and

in man we find an even more expanded individuality, for man knows that he

is a living, conscious being. But all these different personalities have been

borrowed from God; He is the only Life. “O Arjuna! I am the Self in the

heart of all creatures: I am their Origin, Existence, and Finality.” Thus the

Lord describes Himself in the Gita.1 And in the Bible we read His

declaration: “I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith

the Lord, which is and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty.”2

Intuition Develops One’s True Personality

Our soul intuition is a faculty of God. He has no mouth, yet He tastes

everything. He has no hands or feet, yet He feels the whole universe. How?

By intuition, by His omnipresence.

Man ordinarily relies upon his senses to supply him with information about

himself and the world in which he lives. His mind doesn’t know anything

except what his five senses tell him. But the superman relies upon intuition,

his “sixth sense,” for knowledge. Intuition doesn’t depend on the senses or

the power of inference for its data. For example, you feel certain that

something is going to happen, and it does happen, exactly as you foresaw it.

Each one of you has probably had some such experience. How did you

know without any inferential or sense data? That direct knowing is the

soul’s power of intuition.

The ancient Indian sage Patanjali tells us that scriptural authority is not in

itself proof of truth. How then can you know that the Bible and the Gita are

true? The data relayed by the senses and the power of inference cannot give

final proof. Truth is ultimately understood or “proved” solely by intuition,

soul realization.

Your true personality begins to develop when you are able, by deep

intuition, to feel that you are not this solid body but are the divine eternal

current of Life and Consciousness within the body. That is how Jesus could

walk on the water. He realized that everything is composed of the

consciousness of God.

Human personality can be changed to divine personality. Banish the

consciousness that you are a bundle of flesh and bones. Every night God

makes you forget that delusion. But as soon as you wake up you are back

again in the seeming confinements of the body.

Man Can Be Whatever He Wants to Be

Man can change his outer and inner nature by concentration. A person of

strong mind can be whatever he wants to be. The limited human personality

can be greatly expanded by meditation. When you close your eyes and feel

the vastness of the soul within you, and when you can make that

consciousness enduring, then you will have the personality that God

intended you should have. The experience of the wakeful state has become

predominant in your consciousness. But at the time of deep sleep, when

man is granted freedom from the limitations of the flesh, you are in touch

with Truth, with your real personality. Your attitude changes with the

subconscious and superconscious realization: “I am infinite. I am a part of

everything.”

As your consciousness expands with divine understanding, your personality

becomes increasingly attractive and powerful. When your character grows

in a spiritual way, you can assume almost any shade of personality you

desire. Mind is illimitable; and as you develop spiritually and your inner life

becomes separate from body consciousness, you no longer feel any egoistic

attachment to the flesh; you are aware of ineffable freedom.

You shouldn’t identify yourself as any particular type of individual. Rather

be able to change your personality whenever you want to. I have done many

different things in my life, just for the fun of it. I have invested money, I

have done the work of a musician, of a contractor, of a cook. Truly, you can

accomplish anything if you do not accept limitations by identifying yourself

with your present personality. When you say to me that you can’t do this or

that, I don’t believe it. Whatever you make up your mind to do, you can do.

God is the sum total of everything, and His image is within you. He can do

anything, and so can you, if you learn to identify yourself with His

inexhaustible nature.

No matter if you have health and wealth and everything else you want of

the world, still there will always be some disillusion that will bring grief.

Nothing of the earth is lasting; only God is lasting. When you develop the

individuality that is an expression of His presence within you, which is your

true Self, you will be able to attract anything you want. Any other

personality you try to develop—whether that of an artist or a businessman

or a writer—will bring disenchantment in its wake, because all human

expressions have their limitations. You may go after success or money or

fame, and achieve it; but always some flaw—lack of health or insufficient

love or something else—will hurt you. The best course is to pray: “Lord,

make me happy with awareness of Thee. Give me freedom from all earthly

desires, and above all give me Thy joy that outlasts all the happy and sad

experiences of life.”

Never Forget Your True Nature!

Remember that as a child of God you are endowed with greater strength

than you will ever need to overcome all the trials that God may send you.

Often we continue to suffer without making an effort to change; that is why

we don’t find lasting peace and contentment. If we would persevere we

would certainly be able to conquer all difficulties. We must make the effort,

that we may go from misery to happiness, from despondency to courage.

It is necessary first to feel the importance of changing our condition. This

attitude stimulates our will to action. Let us resolve that we will always

make an effort to improve our Self-knowledge and thus continuously better

our existence.

India’s spiritual scientists explored the kingdom of the soul. They have

given to mankind for its benefit certain universal laws of meditation by

which real seekers—those who wish to find a good life by changing

themselves—may scientifically control their minds and attain Self-

realization.

When you develop your divine nature you become completely detached

about the body; you no longer feel identified with it. You look after it as

you would attend to a little child. As you realize your true Self more and

more, by meditation, you become freed from mental and physical pains.

You cast off your lifelong limitations. That is the best way to live out your

days on earth.

Awaken Your Divine Personality

Remember that it is not harmful to own things, but it is harmful to be

owned by them. It is difficult to have the right balance. Struggling too hard

for money, you may neglect your health. You will find that everything will

betray you if you betray your loyalty to God. So let not one drop of oil fall

from the lamp of your attention in the sanctuary of inner silence as you

meditate each day, and as you carefully perform your duties in the world.3

That is the personality you want to develop—dutiful in carrying out your

obligations in life, but aware that your real Home lies within. What is the

use of developing a personality based on worldly values, which are ever

changeful and fleeting? Rather strive for a personality that is derived from

your living in the continuous consciousness of God. Bhagavan Krishna

said: “When a man completely relinquishes all desires of the mind, and is

entirely contented in the Self, by the Self, he is then considered to be one

settled in wisdom.”4

Awaken that meek yet thunderous divine personality—strong as the lion,

gentle as the dove. When you make up your mind that you will meditate

and follow this path, nothing will be able to take you away from it. Perform

your worldly tasks faithfully, without forgetting for a moment your highest

duty, to God.

1 Bhagavad Gita X:20.

2 Revelation 1:8.

3 A story oft-related in India tells of the spiritual test given by the great

saint, King Janaka, to his would-be disciple, Sukadeva. To test the young

devotee before accepting him for spiritual training, Janaka required

Sukadeva to tour the royal palace while carrying in the palm of his hand an

oil lamp filled to the brim. The condition of passing the test was that

Sukadeva was to observe minutely (and subsequently report to the King)

every item and detail in each palatial room, without spilling one drop of oil

from the brimful lamp. The meaning of the test is that the spiritual aspirant

must learn to keep his attention centered in God, not allowing his thoughts

to wander from Him for a moment, lest the oil of divine communion be

spilled, while at the same time he performs accurately to the last detail his

duties in the world.

4 Bhagavad Gita II:55.

The Divine Art of Making Friends

First Self-Realization Fellowship Temple at Encinitas, California, January

22, 1939

Friendship is the noblest human expression of God’s desire to show His

love to man. God showers affection on the baby through the father and

mother; their feeling for the infant is inborn, because our Creator has

ordained that our parents can’t help but love us. But friendship comes to us

as a free, impartial expression of His love.1

Two strangers meet, and by an instantaneous choice of their hearts they

wish to help each other. Have you ever analyzed how this happens? The

spontaneous mutual desire to be friends comes directly from God’s divine

law of attraction; cumulative mutual acts of friendship between two souls in

past lives gradually create a karmic bond that irresistibly attracts them to

each other in this life.

So long as it is uncontaminated by selfishness or attraction to the opposite

sex, this impulse is pure. But often it is tainted. Friendship grows on the tree

of our innermost feelings; it is desecrated by unwholesome desires and

selfish actions. If you put the wrong kind of fertilizer on the roots of a tree,

the fruit that develops will be poor; and when you feed the tree of human

feeling with the emotion of selfishness, your unworthy motives will blemish

the fruit of friendship. To feel interested in someone just because he is rich

or influential and can do something for you is not friendship. And to be

attracted to someone primarily because that person has a beautiful face is

not friendship. When that face loses its youthful attractiveness, the

“friendship” will evaporate.

Develop Friendships From the Past

It is true that you cannot find friendship everywhere. Some persons you see

every day and never know, and others you feel you have known always.

You should learn to recognize that inner cue. Wherever you are, always

keep your eyes open, and if you feel divinely attracted to someone, you

should develop friendship with that person because he has been your friend

in some life before. There are many friends whom we have known in past

lives, but those friendships have not yet been perfected. It is better to start

building on a foundation that has already been laid than to dig for a

foundation on the sands of temporary acquaintances. It is easy for one to

think he has many friends, until they do something hurtful to him, and then

he feels deeply disillusioned.

Many people make mistakes in choosing friends because they are deluded

by outer appearances. The only way to recognize real friends is to meditate

more. You should try to find friends the divine way, and that is to purge

your consciousness of all thought of facial or other appearances as factors

in determining your feelings about others. If you do this, one day you will

be able to discover true friends all around you. You will feel God’s

friendship through those humble human channels that do not resist Him.

Through the pure of heart the divine light of friendship will flow to you.

To Attract Friends, Improve Your Character

You cannot attract true friends without removing from your own character

the stains of selfishness and other unlovely qualities. The greatest art of

making friends is to behave divinely yourself—to be spiritual, to be pure, to

be unselfish—and to start friendship where the foundation of friendship has

already been laid in a past life.

Friendship should exist in all human relations: between parents and

children, between husbands and wives, between men and men, between

women and women, and between men and women. It is unconditional.

When you have the impulse to befriend others, it is the presence of God that

you feel. Friendship is a divine impulse. God is not satisfied to look after

His human children only in the guise of parents and other relatives. He

comes as friends to give us opportunities to express unconditional love from

our hearts.

The more your human shortcomings drop away and divine qualities come

into your life, the more friends you will have. Was not Lord Jesus a great

friend to all, and Lord Buddha, and Lord Krishna? To be like them you

must perfect your love for others. When you can convince others of your

friendship; when you are sure, through the tests of time and many shared

experiences, that a person really feels for you from the soul, and you feel

for that person in the same way—not for any gain, but solely because of the

divine impulse of friendship—you will behold in that relationship the

reflection of God.

Give Friendship to All, As God Does

Do not allow your friendship to remain locked up in one person, but

gradually establish this divine relationship with others of noble ideals. If

you try to build friendship with a wrong-minded person you will be

disillusioned. Be friends first with the truly good, then go on being a friend

to others until you can feel friendship toward everyone, until you can say:

“I am a friend to all, even my enemies.” Even toward those who were

crucifying him, Jesus felt only friendship, exemplifying in his final ordeal

that which he had always taught: “...Love your enemies, bless them that

curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which

despitefully use you, and persecute you.”2

True friendship is divine love, for it is unconditional and it is real and

lasting. Emerson beautifully expressed this ideal in one of his essays:3 “The

highest compact we can make with our fellow is—‘Let there be truth

between us two forevermore.’ ...It is sublime to feel and say of another, I

need never meet or speak or write to him, we need not reinforce ourselves

or send tokens of remembrance; I rely on him as on myself, if he did thus or

thus, I know it was right.” You can talk freely with a friend without being

misunderstood. But friendship can never develop if there is any hint of

demand of one on the other. Friendship can be built only on a basis of

freedom and spiritual equality. Therefore you should treat everyone in that

divine light, in the consciousness that each person is an image of God. If

you mistreat someone you will never know friendship with him.

Many people go through life without friends. I can’t imagine how they are

able to carry on. Real friends seldom misunderstand us, and if they do it is

only for a little while. Should someone abuse your trust, go on giving love

and understanding just the same, as you would hope to receive it. But if that

person continues to behave spitefully, and goes on slapping the extended

hand of friendship, then it is better to withhold your hand for a time.

Universal Friendship Starts at Home

Friendship should start at home. If in your family there is one who is

particularly in harmony with you, develop friendship with that person first.

Then, if you feel drawn to someone of similar ideals among your

acquaintances, develop that relationship. Banish all desires born of

selfishness or sex compulsion. In giving pure friendship you will see the

guidance of God. Develop friendship with good people, and the more you

meditate the more you will recognize friends of the past. Meditation

awakens “sleeping memories of friends once more to be.”4 Many persons

whom I had seen in vision, I later met; and here in America I have found

many whom I saw in vision on the ship as I was first coming to this country

in 1920.

Friendship is a great universal force. When your desire for friendship is

strong enough, though an unknown person who is spiritually attuned to you

be living at the South Pole, the magnetism of friendship will nevertheless

draw you together. Only selfishness can destroy this magnetism within us.

He who thinks of himself all the time wrecks friendship. Such persons

cannot attract friends, because they are unable to expand and receive the

good in life.

God gave you a family so that you may learn how to love others, and then

give that kind of love to all. Our dear ones are taken away from us by death

and other circumstances that we may learn not to love persons in merely

human relationships, but to be in love with Love Itself, which is God, the

Being behind all human masks. “When a man beholds all separate beings as

existent in the One that has expanded Itself into the many, he merges with

Brahman.”5

Friendship means investing your love where there is no prejudice of human

relations. In married life there is the compulsion of sex, and in family life

there is the compulsion of hereditary instincts. But in friendship there is no

compulsion.

Let us give our love to all. Let us pray that we meet our friends of the past

and prove our friendship with them, so that we can finally understand and

merit the friendship of God. Unless we are united with all of His children

through a spirit of friendliness, we will not be united with God.

I know no strangers. What a great state of happiness and joy! Even the

worst enemy cannot make me feel that I am not his friend. When that

awakening comes, you are in love with all. You see that everyone is your

Father’s child, and the love you feel for all beings never dies. It grows,

increasing until you realize, in the love of friends, the divine love of God.

1 “He finds peace who knows Me...as the Infinite Lord of Creation, and as

the Good Friend of all creatures” (Bhagavad Gita V:29).

2 Matthew 5:44.

3 Conduct of Life: Behavior.

4 From “On Coming to the New-Old Land—America,” by Paramahansa

Yogananda, in Songs of the Soul. (Publisher’s Note)

5 Bhagavad Gita XIII:30.

The True Experience of Spiritual Ecstasy

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, December 16, 1934

God has given us the power of spiritual inspiration—realization of the pure

bliss of His presence within us. But the evil force in creation has invented

spurious imitations. The temporarily exhilarating effects of alcohol and

drugs are counterfeits of true spiritual experiences. The use of alcohol and

drugs frequently leads to overindulgence in sex, which shuts out the power

of spiritual inspiration by tying the mind to intense body consciousness.

Many people take wine to banish sad or unpleasant memories and worries,

but that kind of forgetfulness robs man of his native soul wisdom—the very

power by which he was meant to overcome his trials and to find lasting

happiness. God, being Joy Itself, wants us to seek and to find, within our

souls, His ever new bliss.

The counterfeits are harmful, for they are the lures of maya, the cosmic

delusive force that is ever trying to mar all the beautiful expressions of God

in this universe. Throughout creation we see the dual forces of good and

evil opposing each other: God created love, the satanic force created hate;

God created kindness, the satanic force created selfishness; God created

peace, the satanic force created disharmony.

Knowing this, you should realize that alcohol and drugs are detrimental to

your happiness; they obliterate the real joy and intelligence of your soul.

Even one drink, or one indulgence in drugs1 may start a permanent habit,

because there may be such a tendency already imbedded in your

subconsciousness from past lives. What is evil should always be shunned as

evil.

The Wine of Spiritual Ecstasy Is Incomparable

Once you have tasted the wine of spiritual ecstasy, you will find that no

other experience can compare with it. Ever strive to establish the divine

consciousness in your children by teaching them to meditate, that they be

not tempted to play with the fire of delusive counterfeit joys. Sacred bliss is

never-ending, but the pleasures that come from alcohol and drugs are short-

lasting and ultimately bring misery.

Every night in sleep you have a taste of peace and joy. While you are in

deep slumber, God makes you live in the tranquil superconsciousness, in

which all the fears and worries of this existence are forgotten. By

meditation you can experience that holy state of mind when you are awake,

and be constantly immersed in healing peace.

When the divine joy comes, immediately my breath is still and I am lifted

into the Spirit. I feel the bliss of a thousand sleeps rolled into one, and yet I

don’t lose my ordinary awareness. This is universally the experience of

those who go deep in the superconscious state. When the profound ecstasy

of God falls over you, the body becomes absolutely still, the breath ceases

to flow, and the thoughts are quiet—banished, every one, by the magic

command of the soul. Then you drink of God’s bliss and experience an

intoxication of joy that not a thousand draughts of wine could give you.

As the ordinary person drowses on the borderline of sleep, he feels a little

happiness, but he quickly loses that awareness and is fast asleep. Sleep is

not total unconsciousness, for when you awaken, you always know whether

you slept well or not.

There are various kinds of sleep—some light and some deep. But more

intoxicating than even the most blissful slumber are those spiritual

experiences one may have consciously with God. Beyond the mysteries of

the sleepland lie all these divine joys. I can remain in any state I wish to.

Often I stay between the sleepland and the awareness of the world—in the

superconscious state.

Consciousness Has a Limitless Span

Your mind has a vast, a limitless, span; but you do not realize it. I can go

into the depths of sleep and enjoy the sleep state and at the same time be

with the world. Or I can sleep and dream, and at the same time also hear

everything that is going on around me. Sometimes I sleep just as the

ordinary person does, and again I can sleep and consciously watch myself

sleeping. In the superconscious state you can see that your body and mind

are sleeping and yet have total awareness of all happenings. This is possible

only when you have developed the ability to enter at will the

superconsciousness, and return at will to the ordinary state of mind.

You need never worry that by meditation (or by imagination or by the

practice of inner silence) you may go out of the body and fail to return. That

idea is entirely false. The maya-induced attachment to the body is so

powerful that you can’t escape from it that easily! Even if your ordinary

waking awareness is obliterated, so long as your subconscious mind

remains tied to the body you cannot leave it permanently.

What Is the Proof of Self-realization?

If you imagine something very strongly, it becomes visible as a

hallucination, having no intrinsic reality. You should understand the

difference between imagination and Self-realization. The essential proof of

Self-realization—of God’s consciousness in you—is to be truly and

unconditionally happy. If you are receiving more and more joy in

meditation, without cessation, you may know that God is making manifest

His presence in you. If there is a break in the flow of divine happiness, then

there is something wrong in your consciousness, some kink that needs to be

removed with the help of your guru. By maintaining steady communion

with him, through daily meditation and by following his precepts—the

sadhana2 he has given you—he will straighten out that kink for you.

You cannot be with the Lord just by thinking you are divinely enlightened.

You must improve yourself—you must perfect yourself. There is a lot of

difference between the potential realization of God and the actual

realization of God. You can never know Him except through humbleness,

wisdom, and devotion. The humble man is the one who will know God.

Those who go deep in the superconsciousness automatically develop

unusual spiritual powers, and control over natural forces. But no man of

true God-consciousness ever uses his powers unwisely, for egotistical

display. Sages realize that the Lord is the Sole Doer, and humbly return to

Him the extraordinary gifts He has bestowed on them. Is not everything in

the universe a miracle? By his mere existence is not man a miracle? If

human beings are not satisfied with all the wonders that God has created,

why should His saints perform further miracles? They never do, unless—for

some special reason, often an unfathomable one—the Lord so commands

them.

Beyond the Kaleidoscope of Subconsciousness

I will illustrate how the superconsciousness differs from the

subconsciousness. The superconscious is that state in which you can

consciously, during wakefulness or sleep, produce any sensation in your

body at will, without any external stimulus. That is the proof. In the

subconscious dreamland you can drink a glass of hot milk, but this

experience comes to you unbidden; in the superconscious state you can

create that or any other experience consciously and at will. Unless you are

able to do this, do not delude yourself that you have reached

superconsciousness.

Millions of devotees never get beyond the kaleidoscope of the subconscious

mind, which manifests its wonders mostly during sleep. But in the

superconscious state you can see or know anything that you wish to—not

by imagination but in reality. I can sit in this chair and transfer my mind to

India and see exactly what is going on in my old home there.

The advancing devotee progresses through three stages of spiritual

awareness, the Sacred Trinity: First he experiences superconsciousness,

oneness with the creative power in creation: Aum, “God the Holy Ghost.”

Next comes Christ Consciousness, merging in the Infinite Intelligence

within creation: Tat, “God the Son.” Finally, he attains the highest, Cosmic

Consciousness, the Truth beyond creation, the ineffable Absolute: Sat,

“God the Father.”

Sometimes a devotee dwells in the subconsciousness, sometimes he is lifted

to superconsciousness and to Christ Consciousness, and a few great souls

are able to go beyond Christ Consciousness into Cosmic Consciousness, the

realm of Causeless Spirit.

In the Christ-conscious state you don’t have to visualize things first in order

to experience them. You don’t have to picture India—you are there; you are

aware of all creation. That experience is an endless expansion of

consciousness. You are in the blade of grass and on the mountaintop; and

you can feel every cell of your body and every atom of space.

But Cosmic Consciousness is beyond even that. When you can feel your

presence in all creation, and also know the Joy that is beyond creation, then

you are a Godlike being.

1 Except when prescribed as necessary by a reputable medical doctor, and

taken under his supervision.

2 The path of spiritual discipline and instruction given to one by his guru.

(See sadhana in glossary.)

Three Paths to Cosmic Consciousness

Trinity Auditorium, Los Angeles, California, February 9, 1934

So long as even a little tremor of thought and mental restlessness is present,

you cannot reach cosmic consciousness. The Self-Realization Technique of

Concentration1 helps greatly to improve the quality and power of one’s

concentration. Its practice will save the earnest seeker from years of

fruitless wandering on the subconscious plane. That land you want to avoid;

it is full of illusory and imaginative spiritual experiences. One must reach

the superconscious state to have real spiritual experiences and realizations

of truth.2

The world has a habit of much teaching and little practicing. You may hear

a lecture on sugar a hundred times, but you will not know its flavor until

you have tasted it. Neither can the glory of any true teaching be known

except by practice. You have to live the teachings of the prophets and the

great ones. Then their truths become your own, and you realize that truth is

demonstrable, and universal. When you practice truth—whether you call

yourself a Christian, a Hindu, a Buddhist, or a devotee of any other religion

—Christ will claim you, and so will Krishna, Buddha, and all other divine

incarnations of Truth.

Follow the path of truth steadfastly. Remember that out of thousands, only a

few seek God; and out of those seekers, perhaps only one really knows

Him.3 He who is persistent will realize God. So try your best to make

meditation a regular experience in your life. May you never forget God and

never be satisfied until you have Him! Be able to say, “Behind this finite

frame I feel the Infinite.” I never come to class until I know He is with me. I

never teach unless I have made that complete communion. And I know that

when I talk from that plane students will not forget what they have learned.

Concentration—A Requisite for Finding God

To be able to concentrate is essential for spiritual progress; without

concentration you shall never find God. Learn how to shut out of your

consciousness all sounds and other earthly distractions. As soon as your

consciousness is right, God is there. He isn’t hiding from you; you are

hiding from Him. When in deep meditation you see any inner light,4 try to

hold it, and to feel you are inside it, one with it. That is where God is. Try to

realize you are that light of God.

The more peace you feel during concentration and the longer you

concentrate, the deeper you will go in God. If the time given to reading

books about spiritual truth were spent in meditation, you would have far

greater advancement both mentally and spiritually. Sleep less, and give

more hours to meditation; the rest you will enjoy is a hundred times more

refreshing than sleep.

Unless you can cut off sounds from your consciousness you cannot reach

God. That is why saints have sought the seclusion of caves and forests.

Plunge into the inner silence again and again by practicing the methods of

concentration and meditation I have given you, and you will find great

peace and happiness. The Gita says: “Free from ever-hoping desires and

from cravings for possessions, with the heart (waves of feeling) controlled

by the soul (by yoga concentration), retiring alone to a quiet place, the yogi

should constantly try to unite with the soul.”5

The silence of deep meditation should be practiced more in all churches and

temples. Everyone should talk less. During my hermitage training in India

my guru, Swami Sri Yukteswar, would lecture to us only once in a while.

Most of the time we sat around him without any talking, and concentrated

within. If we even stirred, he would reprove us. A real teacher possesses

more than book knowledge, and in spiritual life it is necessary to learn

wisdom from such a teacher; one who knows, and knows that he knows,

because he has experienced—not merely read about—truth.

The Invisible Source of Visible Worlds

Space is divided into two parts or aspects. On one side of space is creation.

On the other side is God alone; creation is completely absent. That is the

world of the “darkless dark” and the “lightless light.” In the Gita the Lord

says: “Where no sun or moon or fire shines, that is My Supreme

Abode....”6

The same duality is true of human consciousness. Your being has two sides

—one visible, the other invisible. With open eyes you behold objective

creation, and yourself in it. With closed eyes you see nothing, a dark void;

yet your consciousness, even when dissociated from form, is still keenly

aware and operative. If in deep meditation you penetrate the darkness

behind closed eyes, you behold the Light from which all creation emerges.

By deeper samadhi, your experience transcends even the manifested Light

and enters the All-Blissful Consciousness—beyond all form, yet infinitely

more real, tangible, and joyous than any sensory or supersensory

perception.

God has given you the opportunity to observe in your own consciousness

the operation of the same laws that govern the universe. The state of

consciousness without form that is experienced with closed eyes may be

compared to the endless region of “darkless dark” and “lightless light,”

where God exists without any of the forms, qualities, and dualities that

characterize the sphere of His material creation. In this boundless stretch of

eternity behind creation, God alone lives in the unqualified consciousness

of ever-existing, ever-conscious, ever-new Bliss. No world or any other

created thing exists in His consciousness in that part of infinity where He

reigns as the Absolute. But on the other side of space He is aware of

everything—all creation—in Himself.

In the Invisible is the factory of the universe. Einstein said that space looks

very suspicious, because everything comes out of it and everything

disappears into it. Whither do electrons vanish, and whole worlds?

Any time you become fascinated by some material creation, close your

eyes, look within, and contemplate its Source. You see nothing, feel

nothing. Yet all visible objects have come out of that Invisible. “The light

shineth in darkness.”7 If you keep peering into the darkness you will find

that great Light. Behind the darkness is the Christ Consciousness. Behind

the darkness is the teeming life of other worlds. “In my Father’s house are

many mansions.”8

Right behind space is Intelligence. And right behind you is God. Live no

longer in ignorance of His presence. Churn the darkness with your

meditation. Don’t stop until you find Him. There is so much to know! so

much to see within! The answer to every problem will come to you straight

from the Infinite. The truths that I perceive within by meditation reveal the

basis of physiological laws that science is discovering by other methods.

When I close my eyes, I can see the subtle life currents flowing in my body.

In the quietness you experience when your eyes are closed, don’t feel you

are alone. God is with you. Why should you think He is not? The ether is

filled with music that is caught by the radio—music that otherwise you

would not know about. And so it is with God. He is with you every minute

of your existence, yet the only way to realize this is to meditate. And those

of you who do meditate should go deeper! Don’t fall asleep at night until

you actually feel some expression of the presence of God within you. Peer

into that darkness until you discover its wondrous secrets.

For your encouragement I tell you of an experience I had today in the

superconscious state. I was sitting in the library at Mt. Washington. It was

about four o’clock. Suddenly my breath disappeared. My limbs became

rigid. I found myself watching the process of death. Breath and movement

had left my body, yet I was conscious. This experience of death was

wonderful. I saw my body and all nature as a cosmic motion picture,

created from God’s light. Joyously I cried, “There is no death, Lord! This

whole world is nothing but a movie!”

A ruler on his throne may say, “Ah, I am king!” but let death give one

knock and he is gone. He is a real king who feels God in all forms in

creation. Death shall not frighten him, because he beholds it as a portal to

the divine kingdom.

The First Path to Cosmic Consciousness

Of the three ways to expand human consciousness into cosmic

consciousness, the first is the social way, wherein you shut out “self” and

live for all. Be loyal to your friends, and feel love for everyone. God gave

you a family that you might expand your consciousness by caring and doing

for others. In family life we learn love and self-sacrifice for our loved ones,

and thus attain some expansion of consciousness. But this is not enough.

Love that becomes personal is exclusive, confined; when love becomes

impersonal, it expands. Develop impersonal love; be able to give everyone

the same love that you bestow on your family, and to do for others exactly

as you would for yourself. The social way to cosmic consciousness is to

behave toward everyone in this way.

God loves all His children alike—they are all His divine family, and His

love is impersonal. His children should give that same kind of love to one

another. This is the divine plan. To forget it is to suffer. The whole world-

attitude should change. You are everyone, because your true nature is

omnipresence.

I enjoy giving things to others; I feel the greatest happiness in seeing their

joy. When we feel for and love others, we find that all of creation responds

to us. Jesus, who gave up his body “as a ransom for many,”9 showed us the

social way of attaining cosmic consciousness. Christlike, you too should

serve all men as your Self.

The man of cosmic consciousness is a happy man. He doesn’t limit his love

to a few, excluding everyone else. So should you make the whole world

your own family. Will you remember? This consciousness is with me every

moment. I have no caste, no country—I feel that all are mine. Love all men

as your brothers, love all women as your sisters, and all older people as

your parents. Love all human beings as your friends.

The Second Path

The second way to cosmic consciousness is the way of self-discipline. Do

not be a victim of immoderation. Enjoy things, but don’t be attached to

them. Be free. Be pleasant and self-controlled. Avoid becoming a slave to

wrong habits, and act only according to your righteous convictions. To

attain cosmic consciousness it is necessary to possess self-control and to

rise above dualities—heat and cold, pleasure and sorrow, health and

sickness. Learn to endure all things without any excitement or disturbance

of mind. “He who is everywhere nonattached, neither joyously excited by

encountering good nor disturbed by evil, has an established wisdom.”10

The Third and Highest Path

Lastly is the way of meditation—the metaphysical path. If while meditating

you are still conscious of the breath, you are tied to body awareness. To

enter cosmic consciousness one must free himself from the bonds of the

body through guru-given meditation methods.

If you put a sealed jar of water in a tank of water, that which is in the jar is

separated from that which surrounds the jar; but if you remove the lid, the

water in the jar and the water in the tank can mingle. Similarly, ordinary

people shut out God because their consciousness is sealed in by the lid of

ignorance. When that lid is removed by right methods of meditation, one

feels the peace of God inside and outside the body. As you increase the

length and depth of your meditations you will find more and more peace,

and an ever new joy. Whatever else you may try, it will not produce the

divine consciousness that comes from meditation.

The Lord is all around, but you don’t feel Him. And you cannot feel Him,

within or without, until you remove the lid of ignorance and merge your

consciousness with His, to discover Him within yourself. If you sink in

material desire you will suffocate. If you sink in the ocean of God you will

live forevermore.

Once you have found God, you experience real and lasting satisfaction.

Human friendships may be severed, but God will never leave you. Though

everyone else forsake you, if you have Him, you have everything.

1 Concentration is a state of complete one-pointedness and stillness of

consciousness. The nature of creation is motion; the nature of Spirit is

motionlessness. “Be still, and know that I am God” (Psalms 46:10).

Concentration is therefore essential to divine communion. The techniques

of concentration and meditation taught in Self-Realization Fellowship

Lessons lead to perfect attunement of human consciousness to divine

consciousness. (See Concentration Technique in glossary.)

2 The subconscious level of man’s awareness has its usefulness as the

repository of memory and as the land of sleep and dream. But in meditation

it can be a real deterrent, luring the absentminded, imaginative, or

psychically inclined aspirant into a realm of fanciful hallucinations that

have no more reality or spiritual value than one’s ordinary dreams at night.

Scientific meditation techniques, and the devotee’s own effort to practice

them correctly, draw the mind instead to the superconscious state of Self-

realization and God-communion.

3 “Among thousands of men, perhaps one strives for spiritual attainment;

and, among the blessed true seekers that assiduously try to reach Me,

perhaps one perceives Me as I am” (Bhagavad Gita VII:3).

4 The light of God or the spiritual eye.

5 Bhagavad Gita VI:10.

6 Bhagavad Gita XV:6.

7 John 1:5.

8 John 14:2.

9 Matthew 20:28.

10 Bhagavad Gita II:57.

Be a Smile Millionaire

Self-Realization Fellowship Temple, Hollywood, California, January 29,

1950

The real smile is the smile of bliss that comes when you meditate, when you

feel the joy of God’s presence. That is the smile on Lahiri Mahasaya’s1

face. He is seeing the world partially, but seeing God fully. My smile comes

from a joy deep within my being, a joy that you also may attain. Like a

fragrance it oozes out from the core of the blossoming soul. This joy calls

others to bathe in its waters of divine bliss.

The average man is familiar with four states of mind. When a desire is

fulfilled, he is happy. When a desire is denied, he is unhappy. When he is

neither glad nor sorrowful, he is bored. When these three emotions, these

three states of mind—pleasure, pain, and boredom—are sloughed off, he

has peace.

Beyond Peace Is Bliss

Peace is the absence of the alternations of sorrow and pleasure, and the

absence of boredom. It is a very desirable state. After a tumultuous ride on

the crests of pain and pleasure, with frequent dips into the troughs of

boredom, you enjoy floating on the calm sea of peace. But greater than

peace is bliss—bliss of the soul. It is an ever new joy that never disappears,

but remains with your soul through eternity. That joy can be attained only

by perceiving God.

If you place a pot of water under the rays of the moon and then agitate the

water, you create a distorted reflection of the moon. When you still the

waves in the pot, the reflection becomes clear. The time when the water in

the pot is quiet and clearly reflecting the moon, is comparable to the

meditative state of peace, and the still deeper state of calmness. In the peace

of meditation all waves of sensations and thoughts are absent from the

mind. In the deeper state of calmness, one perceives in that stillness the

moonèd reflection of God’s presence. Peace is a negative state, being

merely the absence of the waves of pleasure, pain, and indifference; and so

after a little while the meditator is attracted once more by the desire to

experience the waves of motion. But as meditative peace deepens into

calmness and the ultimate positive state of bliss, the meditator experiences a

joy that is ever new and all-satisfying.

When you sleep, you still thoughts and sensations passively. When by

meditation you still thoughts and sensations consciously, you experience

first the state of peace; and the muscles of your face will form a smile that

reflects the peace of your heart. But you must look beyond peace in order to

behold, undistorted by sensory stimuli and motor reflexes from sense-

associated thoughts, the purity of your soul. The state you feel then is ever

new bliss. Saints always have this joy in their hearts. Secure in the divine

inner assurance, they are unshaken by anger or fear. Using the scalpel of

reason or intuition, they can dissect their own or others’ thoughts on the

operating table of the mind and remain unmoved. “In soul bliss all grief is

annihilated. Indeed, the discrimination of the blissful man soon becomes

firmly established (in the Self).”2

Smile With the Love of God

Most smiles are born of good emotions arising out of doing good, or out of

feeling sympathy, love, kindness, or mercy. But the most wonderful way to

smile is to fill your heart with the love of God. Then you will be able to

love everybody; you will be able to smile all the time. All other forms of

smiles are evanescent because emotions flicker and pass away, no matter

how good they are. The only thing that can last is the joy of God. When you

have that, you can smile all the time. Otherwise, when you are feeling

merciful toward someone and he returns your kindness with a slap, you

won’t be able to feel mercy toward him any longer.

A man I knew made a great show of his distress when his wife died. I saw

through his emotionalism. “You will marry within a month,” I told him. He

was so angry at me he would not see me after that, but he did remarry

within a month. He thought his love for the first wife was so great, but you

see how quickly he forgot her.

I shall never forget how much my guru, Sri Yukteswarji, taught me when he

told me this little story about his life: “When I was a little boy I took a

notion that I wanted an ugly little dog belonging to a neighbor. I kept my

household in turmoil for weeks to get that dog. My ears were deaf to offers

of pets with more prepossessing appearance. I wanted only that dog.”

The same sort of fixation seizes people in so-called romance. Lovers

become hypnotized by a face; they can’t forget it. But the real beauty we

should seek in others is not outward, but inward.

When your soul is filled with joy you are attractive. I like only divine

smiles, because without them, human beings are like puppets—today they

are saying they will love you forever; tomorrow they are in the grave.

Where is their great love then? Where is the promise, “I’ll love you

forever”? But if you can make God say even once to you, “I love you,” it is

for eternity. Why do you waste your time for a little human love, and

money, and this and that, when in God you can find everything—all the

love that is in the whole world, all the power in creation? But don’t seek

Him for power; seek Him for love. Then you will discover the chink in His

armor. When you give Him your unconditional love, He can no longer

refuse you Himself.

To Find Bliss, Meditate

Meditate more. You do not know how wonderful it is. It is much greater to

meditate than to spend hours seeking money or human love or anything else

that you can think of. The more you meditate, and the more your mind stays

centered in the spiritual state during activity, the more you will be able to

smile. I am always there now, in that bliss-consciousness of God. Nothing

affects me; whether I am alone or with people, that joy of the Lord is

always there. I have retained my smile—but to win it permanently was hard

work! The same smiles are there within you; the same joy and bliss of the

soul is there. You don’t have to acquire them, but rather regain them. You

have merely lost them temporarily by identifying yourself with the senses.

If you think that objects of sight, hearing, taste, smell, and touch will give

you supreme joy, you are mightily mistaken. They will only take it away. If

you put conditions around your joy—“without the sight of that face I cannot

be happy”—you will never find unalloyed bliss. Because no sense-

produced pleasure is permanent. Time relentlessly works its havoc on

physical beauty; everything in the material world is subject to change.

Therefore if you could see all the beautiful faces in the world; if you were

to hear all the music and touch everything that you desire to, you would still

not have found real happiness. You may imagine you are happy, however.

Sometimes, after you have dug and dug to get at some object of desire, you

find no happiness in the object itself, yet you derive a certain satisfaction

from the labor you have put into getting it, and you therefore think you are

happy. But such satisfactions are short-lived.

So do not seek your happiness in the senses. Find joy within and express it

in your face. When you do that, wherever you go a little smile will

surcharge everyone with your divine magnetism. Everybody will be happy!

But remember it is the Lord alone who changes each heart; we must not at

all ascribe to ourselves the power to do good. The only one who does good

is God. It is His world. If you feel Him as the Indweller of this body—that

it is He who works in everything; and if you give everything—both good

and bad actions—to Him, you will be surprised to see how all your actions

gradually will be changed to good. You will not be able to do anything

wrong when the consciousness of God is with you. Give your life to Him.

In all you do, say, “It’s You, Lord, not I! Not I, Lord!” Destroy ego; it is a

great obstruction to this liberating realization. You are not the Doer; can you

lift your hand if the Lord quenches the little beam of life in your medulla

oblongata?3

How to Banish External Impressions

Once I was sitting outdoors at Encinitas, and it was very cold. I turned my

consciousness within, and in a twinkling I couldn’t feel the cold at all. Joy

came over me; once in a while I saw my surroundings melt into one light,

like the beam of a motion picture. If I concentrated on the picture, I saw the

picture. If I concentrated on the beam, the world vanished. You cannot see

anything without your consciousness. So if you have full mastery over your

mind, and you look within at your soul, even though your eyes are open you

will see only that great light of God, and feel His great joy. Only as you

look outward through the eyes will your consciousness perceive the outer

world. It is all God's motion picture. I could see, that day in Encinitas, on

one side the sensations and thoughts that were dreams of my consciousness

which came from God, and on the other side, as I retired within, no

sensations at all—just pure joy. And though I was sitting in that extreme

cold, clad only in swim trunks, I could feel the cold and the scenery

disappear and joy alone come; later I felt the slight impressions of

sensations together with that great joy.

Practice this—practice the presence of God. Don’t be satisfied with a little

prayer, or seeing a little light, and then going to bed. Sleep is a drug. If you

can fairly control sex; if you can fairly control all the senses; and if you go

after God with all the power of your soul, He will come to you. Even if you

are a great moralist and a spiritually inclined person, without the perception

of God you have very little.

So do not deceive yourself. Meditate more—unceasingly and sincerely. Tell

God, “I know my weaknesses. But Lord, they belong to You, because You

created me. I have no wish for anything except to be with You, because You

are the One who is showing this movie. You are free from its dual aspects

of comedy and tragedy. So am I free, because I am Your child.”

Don’t call yourself a sinner; nor call yourself righteous and be proud. Say

rather that the Lord is with you, and that He—no one else!—is working

through you. Then you will see a different world. Without the

consciousness of God this world appears full of struggle, violence, and

terrible disappointments. But with Him it is a haven of happiness.

When I was watching the motion picture, Song of Bernadette, I was so

deeply touched by some of the events in the saint’s life that I cried. At last I

said: “What’s the matter with me?” I looked at the picture again and saw

only shadows and light; I lost the consciousness of drama. I couldn’t cry

anymore; a great joyous state came over me.

The Motion Picture of Creation

In a second, God can duplicate the form of any person who has gone out of

the world; He wants you to know that. He wants you to understand that this

creation is a show. If you take the show seriously, you are going to get hurt,

and you won’t like it; you won’t be able to stand life, with its sorrow and

disease and pain. Whenever anything hurts the body, I put my mind at the

seat of spiritual awareness at the point between the eyebrows; then I feel no

pain at all. But when I concentrate on the hurt, I feel the delusion of pain. If

you can keep your mind centered in the spiritual consciousness of your soul

you will not suffer when the delusive shadows of sorrow appear on your

mental screen. Pray to God unceasingly to reveal Himself as the sole joyous

Reality.

You have already lost so much time—death may take you away at any

moment, and then you won’t have time to know Him. You must realize Him

before you go out of the body cage. Tell Him, “I want to feel Your

presence.” But He won’t let you out of this hospital of delusion

permanently until you cure yourself of the disease of desires. Do everything

for God. Working for Him is just as important to your spiritual progress as

meditation.

Meditate on the Lord at night until you are uplifted in Him and feel locked

in His joy; and when you come down to perform activities during the day,

bring and keep with you the remembrance of that state. Then you will be all

the time with God. And you will always be able to smile and say, “A little

bit of sorrow or a little bit of pleasure or a little bit of peace cannot create

any tumult in the ocean of ever new bliss that fills my soul.”

Laugh at maya, delusion. Watch life as a cosmic motion picture, then it

cannot work its delusive magic on you anymore. Be in God-bliss. When

you can stand unshaken ’midst the crash of breaking worlds, you shall

know that God is real. He doesn’t mean to hurt you. He has made you in

His image. He has made you already what He is. That is what you don’t

realize, because you acknowledge only that you are a human being; you do

not know that this thought is a delusion.

When you are suffering from cancer it is not fun. Yet St. Francis suffered

from diseases and at the same time he was healing the sick and raising the

dead. His divine joy could not be taken away. So by all means get to God.

But He won’t receive you until you prove to Him that you do want Him and

that you have no desire to get mixed up in His show.

Don’t Question God—Love Him

Nor should you question God. You will reap only doubt. You will not be

able to understand His laws until you become one with Him. So why waste

time trying to understand them by an intellectual approach? If you are

reading a novel in which the hero is being mistreated, the villain is winning,

and each chapter seems to contradict the preceding one, you will feel

frustrated and angry with the author. But when you read the last chapter you

are satisfied, and you think how wonderful that novel was because it was so

complex. So God is the Master-Novelist, and one is wonderstruck at the

paradoxes and intricate plot of His creation. Don’t try to solve these riddles;

you will be lost. When you find Him, in that last chapter, He will give you

the solutions to all the enigmas of human life. And you won’t be able to

question His wisdom when you hear His replies. That I know!

Live with God in your heart and have no fear in the world—fear will be

afraid of you! You will be free from this cosmic delusion. Then you will

smile, “I know at last the mystery of it all.” But don’t try to know first; love

God first. Then He will tell you everything. And you can smile an eternal

smile. Your thoughts, your words, your writings, and everything you do will

be impregnated with the joy shining in that smile. Wherever you meditate

you will leave behind a fragrance of smiles, and whoever will come there

will also be moved to smile with God. You can smile all the time when you

dwell in His ineffable bliss.

1 A reference to the photograph of Lahiri Mahasaya, the guru of

Paramahansa Yogananda’s guru. The unusual circumstances surrounding

the taking of this photograph are described in Autobiography of a Yogi,

chapter 1.

2 Bhagavad Gita II:65.

3 The medulla center (or chakra) is the principal point at which life force

enters into the body.

Lord, Possess Us With Thy Love

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, on Paramahansaji’s birthday, January 5, 1945, following

traditional Indian ceremonies honoring the Guru’s birth

Each of us is a child of God. We are born of His spirit, in all its purity and

glory and joy. That heritage is unassailable. To condemn oneself as a sinner,

committed to the path of error, is the greatest of all sins. The Bible says:

“Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God

dwelleth in you?”1

Always remember: your Father loves you unconditionally. But because He

has given you freedom to go away from Him or to approach Him, He is

waiting for you to express your desire for His love before He comes to you.

Once when I was meditating I heard His voice, whispering: “Thou dost say

I am away, but thou didst not come in. That is why thou dost say I am away.

I am always in. Come in and thou wilt see Me. I am always here, ready to

greet thee.”

Deep sincerity is necessary in the spiritual path. In guilelessness comes the

birth of Spirit. Jesus said: “Thou hast hid these things from the wise and

prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes.”2 Before God our human

wisdom is nothing. The only way we can coax Him to surrender Himself to

us is by offering to Him the same unconditional love that He gives to us.

Everyone will eventually find salvation, but those who tarry on the way fall

into the ditch of indifference. Indifference prevents man from realizing how

important it is to find God now, in this moment. Our great whirling planet,

our human individuality, were not given to us merely that we might exist

for a time and then vanish into nothingness, but that we might question

what it is all about. To live without understanding the purpose of life is

foolish, a waste of time. The mystery of life surrounds us; we were given

intelligence in order to solve it.

God Is the Lover Behind All Love

I have realized, by searching for lasting love, that it was Someone Else who

cared for me through all human loves. The Divine has loved me as mother,

as father, and as friends. I searched for that one Friend behind all friends,

that one Lover whom I now see glimmering in all your faces. And that

Friend never fails me.

God is behind everything. “Honor thy father and thy mother,”3 but “love

the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy

might.”4 You should understand the importance of cultivating divine

friendship with Him, and of not wasting any more time. How do you know,

when you go to sleep, whether or not you will wake up? One by one we

leave this earth. But there is nothing to grieve about. When we die, we are

required to be reborn on earth, starting another life where we left off in this

one.

I behold life and death like the rise and fall of waves on the sea. At birth a

wave rises from the surface, and at death it sinks into sleep in the bosom of

God. I have realized this. I know I can never die; for whether I am sleeping

in the ocean of Spirit or awake in a physical body, I am ever with Him. That

supreme happiness cannot be found in the world; but we need not run away

to the jungle to seek Him. We can find Him in this jungle of daily life, in

the cave of inner silence.

It doesn’t matter how many mistakes you have made; they are only

temporary. You are formed in the image of Spirit. The Lord created this

delusory motion picture of earth and all its pleasures for but one purpose:

that perchance you would see through His play of maya and forsake it to

love Him alone. This is the truth; it cannot be otherwise. Why are we made

to feel love for our family members, only to watch them slip away, one by

one? These events take place to help us realize that it is He who is loving us

behind all loved ones.

The difficulty about this motion picture of life is that all unrealities seem

real, and all realities seem unreal. Each night in sleep the world is made to

disappear from our consciousness, so we might understand that the material

universe is not real. This lesson of sleep comes not to frighten us, but to

make us seek the reality of God. The soul can never be satisfied with

anything but Him and His love. His spirit is the reality that nothing else can

match.5

Don’t Waste Time

So many years are gone from our lives already. And only so many years,

weeks, days, and hours are left. Don’t waste time. In your heart, tell Him

night and day, “Lord, I want Thee.” Never be insincere about that. Never

reason, “Tomorrow I will seek God. Today let me have a good time.”

Always say, “Today, my Lord, today I want Thee.”

Just now I see the great light of God spread everywhere—such joy, such

light! “Lord, I bow to Thee on this beautiful occasion in which Thou art

born in us in new glory. May I always be blessed with awareness of Thy

presence, and may each one of us here be thus blessed, that we may all

know Thou art seeking to be born anew in our consciousness.”

Love Him, talk to Him every second of your life, in activity and in silence,

with deep prayer, with the unceasing desire of your heart; and you shall see

the screen of delusion melt away. He who is playing hide-and-seek in the

beauty of flowers, in souls, in noble passions, in dreams, shall come forth

and say: “You and I have been apart for a long time, because I desired that

you give Me your love willingly. You are made in My image, and I wanted

to see if you would use your freedom to give Me your love.”

I pray that God give you the imperishable gift of His love. But without

effort you won’t find Him. If you make twenty-five percent of the effort, the

rest of it will come through God and guru. This evening has passed like a

moment, for He has been with me every second. This is what I wanted to

feel, that you are showing appreciation to me merely to express your

appreciation of Him who sent me. May His blessings be ever with you; may

His consciousness never leave you. May you realize, within and without,

the fullness of His presence.

Call God Your Own

God doesn’t readily respond to us, because we are shy before Him; we fail

to show how much we want Him. Don’t be afraid of Him. Call Him your

own and pursue Him unceasingly, in thought and in action, and you shall

find Him to be the greatest haven of safety.

“I offer the bouquet of these souls to Thee, O Father, that they may adorn

the altar of Thy presence. Be Thou unceasingly with them. Father, Thou art

the head of this family. We are Thy children, gathered together to sing the

glory of Thy name. Banish the darkness of ignorance with Thy light; drive

away all gloom from the shores of our minds with the expanding light of

Thy presence. Naughty or good, we are Thy children. Reveal Thyself unto

us. Bless everyone here. I feel their kind thoughts for me. All kindness,

honor, respect, and love given to me, I offer to Thee, O Father! Thou art my

love, my all.

“Bless us with Thy grace. Destroy our desire for anything but Thee. Be

Thou the King sitting on the throne of all our ambitions. Let the light of

Thy glory spread over the vast world. Bless us all, saturate us with Thy

presence. May we realize more and more that Thou hast always been ours.

Thou art ours now; Thou wilt ever be ours. We thank Thee for the

benediction and love Thou hast bestowed upon Thy family assembled here.

May we all someday celebrate Thy birth in us in eternity, in immortality,

and in unceasing joy.”

Pray with me: “Our Father, bless us that when we are free, we may gather in

heaven to celebrate Thy birth within us. Manifest Thyself within and

without. Unite us all; in the light of that union may we find Thy One

Presence. With all the devotion of our merged hearts, of our united souls,

we fall at Thy feet of omnipresence. Bless us that we never be indifferent to

Thee. May an undying fire of love possess our hearts. We bow to Thee, our

Father, our very own. Thy presence be with us now and forever.”

1 I Corinthians 3:16.

2 Matthew 11:25.

3 Matthew 19:19.

4 Deuteronomy 6:5.

5 “Of the unreal, there is no existence. Of the real, there is no nonexistence.

The final truth of both of these is known by men of wisdom” (Bhagavad

Gita II:16).

Paramahansa Yogananda in the early 1920s

Controlling Your New Year’s Destiny

Self-Realization Fellowship Temple, Hollywood, California, January 2,

1944

If you saturate with devotion a thought of God, and by your concentration

impress that thought deep within you, then in the temple of

superconsciousness the Lord of the universe will come to receive that

loving thought.

Ask God to help you fulfill all the good thoughts and resolutions that you

are making now for the New Year. Resolve that you are going to do just

what you think you should do, and that under no circumstances are you

going to be cowed into doing otherwise by your old bad habits.

There was a great lesson for me in the book I have been writing. I used to

write without ever reading over the manuscript—a task I always avoided.

But I had to go over and over every bit of my autobiography.1 The Lord

disciplined me, yet in a noble way, because I have enjoyed reliving those

wondrous experiences as I read the account again.

I have ventured many projects in this life. I have lectured, designed and

built buildings, done artwork, played musical instruments, planted gardens,

founded a school, but always the secret of my success was will power. I can

truthfully say that destiny is what you make it.

Analyze yourself. What happened to your good intentions and noble

ambitions of the past year? Did you let them die for want of dynamic will-

to-accomplish? Make a strong determination to avoid repetition of old

errors in this New Year. Plan your time. Resolve that you are not going to

be an automaton run by the world and by your own habits; that is not the

way to true happiness. You must change; you must be able to change. Vague

desire to improve is not enough. You have made yourself what you are now,

and you can become whatever you want to be, but you have to use will

power.

More confining than stone walls are the prison bars of habit. You carry this

invisible prison with you wherever you go. But you can be free! Determine

now to break out of the jail of habits and race for freedom. How frightful

life is, that from the age of three we are limited by habit. As soon as I

realized I was caged in by habit I broke through all the bars. I would not

permit myself to be bound by habits that made me say, “I can’t do that,” or,

“I have to do this,” or, “Don’t do that to me, it makes me nervous,” or, “I

can’t stand the cold,” and so on.

Why are these habits so strong from early childhood? Because they have

been carried over from previous-life experiences. Our moods are inkmarks

traced on the graph of life by the karma of the past. Wrong habits and

moods are more offensive than the odor of the skunk. Why behave like a

human polecat, making everyone else uncomfortable and punishing

yourself as well? At one time or another we all have done so, because we

all have carried with us obnoxious peculiarities.

Reclaim Your Lost Divinity

But we can overcome undesirable traits. The human mind is elastic. If you

pull it gradually, it will yield to your tugs. Yet you don’t even try. God has

given us more than enough power to overcome all the trials and

shortcomings of our lives. Saint Francis, though ill and sightless, could heal

the sick and raise the dead. Outwardly blind, inwardly he beheld the great

Light of the universe. God puts His true children such as Saint Francis to

greater tests than He gives to ordinary people. But no one passes through

the gates of freedom until he has passed all God’s tests, until he has learned

to live like a true son of God. Why should you think of yourself as a weak

mortal? You are potentially a son of God. You do not have to acquire

anything; you have only to know.

To try to be a millionaire in this incarnation is really much more difficult

than to be a true son of God. Earthly environment is so limited that many

people die without having become what they want to be. But to know God

is possible in one lifetime, because you don’t have to acquire Him; He is

already your own.

Even if everyone were to pray day and night to become as rich as Henry

Ford, their prayers could not be granted because earth is not a place where

everybody can be a Henry Ford. But everyone can be rich in Spirit, for God

has given everyone equal power to become like Him. When you claim your

divinity, everything belongs to you. A Henry Ford might lose his wealth or

his health, but a Jesus Christ can create health or wealth or anything else he

wants, at will. So don’t long to be as rich or as healthy as someone else;

have only one desire: to be like God. Jesus never claimed that he was the

only son of God. The Father loves you, His child, just as much as He loves

Jesus. And God won’t deny you anything if, like Jesus, you establish your

true status with Him. Meditation is the way to reclaim your lost divinity.

Habits are grafts on our real nature, which is ever free Spirit. In my

childhood I used to get very angry, but when I made up my mind not to, I

never again gave in to anger. If I hadn’t used my will I wouldn’t have been

able to accomplish that, or anything else in this life. You too can use your

will. The errors of a lifetime can be corrected today. Make a resolution in

this New Year to realize the truth that although as a mortal man you have

certain habits, as a divine being you are free. Why should you lie to

yourself? Why should you ascribe to yourself the faults of the past? You

must destroy them. Otherwise they will become grafts on your tree of life.

You must not allow that. Affirm again and again: “I am a child of God. I am

one with God.”

Apply Will and Discrimination to Resolution

Every strong resolution you make with great determination can become a

habit at once. Why should you not be able to do what you wish, guided by

reason? You must try. Away with all your faults! Review your actions of the

past year. See what troublesome habits you may have displayed: perhaps

you fight with people, or you eat too much, or you are jealous. Make up

your mind today, and know that you are never going to do those things

again. Just say to yourself, “Paramahansaji said he had an aversion to

editing, but he became an editor; and if he could make himself an editor, I

can do this.” Why couldn’t you? Everything I have tried to do with will

power has worked. And I give you hope that if you make up your mind, you

too will succeed. God has given you the power to dynamite your troubles.

“Beware, O ye mountains, stand not in my way! Your ribs will be shattered

and tattered today!” Those words are from a song by a great swami.2 In

another part he sang, “I hitch to my chariot the fates and the gods!”

The Romans used to tie prisoners to chariots and drag them on the ground

—a terrible practice! Yet in it is a lesson for us, for we allow our habits to

treat us in the same way. We should make habits our prisoners rather than

our captors; hitching them to the chariot of our will, we should drive them

instead of letting them drag us. To be able to do whatever we know we

should do, not merely that which we whimsically want to do, is to be really

free.

Learn to discriminate in this New Year: examine every impulse that comes,

to see if it is the right thing for you to act on. And when your reason tells

you to do a certain thing, let neither the fates nor the gods stand in your

way. But if you find out that you are wrong, be able to change your mind.

Some people are so stubborn, they do not want to admit they are wrong. But

one should be guided by reason, not by blind will. If, after calmly

reasoning, you make up your mind that what you have set out to do is right,

then nobody should be able to stop you. If I had no job I would shake up the

whole world until people would say, “Give him a job to keep him quiet!” (I

do not say these things out of personal pride, but that you may learn from

my experiences.)

Work of any kind, if done in the right spirit, gives you victory over yourself.

You may clean bathrooms, but if you do it with the thought of serving and

helping people, you are showing the right spirit of a man of God. The

attitude with which you work is what counts. Mental laziness and working

unwillingly spoil one. People often ask me, “How do you do so many

things?” It is because I do everything with the greatest pleasure and spirit of

service. Inwardly I am all the time with God. And though I sleep very little

I always feel fresh, because I perform my duties with the right attitude: that

it is a privilege to serve.

You must realize that you are a child of God. Make up your mind that you

are not going to be run by that old habit-bound self. The temporary

limitations and imperfections of the body and brain cannot hold you back;

as soon as you give the verdict and strongly will to be a new person, you

will change.

You have been a prisoner of your habits and it has not been good for you. It

is because of wrong habits of thinking and acting in this and in other lives

that your bodily kingdom yields now to invasions of disease, troubles,

moods, and ignorance. From now on you must say: “I am not the slave of

the body. I am the dictator of my own kingdom. My thoughts are going to

be exactly as I wish them to be.” Once you have changed your habits, you

will say to yourself, “How simple it was to do it! How unkind I have been

to myself by not exchanging my soul-stultifying habits for those that bring

happiness.”

Are You a Psychological Antique?

Habit-bound people can best be described as psychological antiques. They

are the same, year in and year out. They say the same old things, do the

same old things. Converse with them just a little while and you can

anticipate exactly what their next remark will be. Take a look in the mirror

of introspection and see if you are a psychological antique. Most people are.

But why should you be one? Change your habits. Cast out moods. Try to be

better every day. Let people be able to say, “What a wonderful change has

come over him!”

The man of Self-realization has achieved mastery over the old habit-dulled

self. Recognizing such mastery in Jesus, the officers who had been sent by

the Pharisees to arrest him came away marveling instead at his assurance,

saying, “Never man spake like this man.”3 A master’s nature is infinite; it

cannot be contained in the narrow confines of human conceptions. Every

time I thought I had succeeded in categorizing my guru, Swami Sri

Yukteswarji, I found him to be different, greater, nonclassifiable.

Sometime you have to break the habit of attachment to the mortal body and

get back to God. There is no alternative. You are a prodigal son here on

earth. Your infinite nature must be rediscovered. You will never be happy so

long as you remain habit-mired in ignorance of your eternal soul-nature. It

does not matter who you are; the only way you can find lasting joy is to go

back to God. You do not have to leave earth’s shores and put on wings; you

must learn rather to be happy here and now, under all conditions; and to

include others’ happiness in your own joy. Go out of your way to make

others happy. You cannot please everybody, but to those souls who cross

your path, give kindness and love. There is no more liberating action than

sincerely to give people kindness in return for unkindness. Why not be like

a flower that gives fragrance even when crushed in the hand? The Gita

teaches: “He who is free from hatred toward all creatures, is friendly and

kind to all...is dear to Me.”4

If people criticize you, do not ignore them. See if you have the fault they

ascribe to you, and if you do, silently correct your error. But it is seldom

necessary to confess your faults to others; often it is unwise. Should they

become angry with you, they might unkindly hold your confession over

your head as a threat. To a God-realized spiritual teacher or guru you can

tell your faults, but not to someone who cannot help you, and who might

instead hurt you by broadcasting your flaws to others.

A Stream of Divine Power

Learn to mix with good people. The faces of many of you who come here

have become more spiritual. And the more you are in tune with me and

refrain from fussing about little things, the better you will be. A steady

stream of divine power will flow to you, for the Great Ones sent me here.

When I am gone you will realize this truth with greater impact. I am here

only to deliver their message. Little by little a spiritual change will come to

the true followers of this path, and their influence will spread over the

world. Self-Realization is one of the greatest spiritual movements ever sent

to help mankind. It has been blessed by the Great Ones—Mahavatar Babaji,

Lahiri Mahasaya, Sri Yukteswar—in communion with Christ and Krishna.

The grace of these masters is not gone from the earth. They are waiting to

help you and to help the world, but they can work only through the free

choice of man. The world has gone mad with hate and war, but Jesus’ way

of brotherly love is the solution to the world’s problems. We can make this

world proof against war by following his teachings as he meant us to.

On this last meditation day,5 Christ came to me several times: first as a little

child, then as a grown man, and finally as he looked before his crucifixion. I

had been thinking that I would have to meditate long, before he would

come to me. And he surprised me! God was showing me through this

experience that no further effort is needed once you have convinced Him

that you want Him more than all the gifts of the world. Then He takes away

the screen of mystery and comes to you as Christ or Krishna, or Babaji, or

as any great incarnation in whose form you desire to behold Him.

Make up your mind that in this New Year you are going to be more

Christlike in your behavior. You must make the effort now. You must

meditate more. Self-Realization Fellowship was not brought into existence

merely to give glimpses of God through words, but that you might know

Him through your own experience. We teach that true fellowship with man

can come only after one has gained experience of God. If you contact God

within yourself, you will know that He is in everyone, that He has become

the children of all races. Then you cannot be an enemy to anyone. If the

whole world could love with that universal love there would be no need for

men to arm themselves against one another. By our own Christlike example

we must bring unity among all religions, all nations, all races.

We must train ourselves to plain living and high thinking. It would be good

if each family had a small garden in which to grow some of their food. Live

more simply, so that you can find time to enjoy the little pleasures of life.

Man races through his span, working, eating, sleeping; and that is about all

he accomplishes. Eliminate any habit or activity that disturbs your mental

peace and happiness.

In this New Year, resolve to cast out from the temple of your mind all the

devils of bad habits; to plan your life so that you can do all the things you

want to do. If it is happiness you want, have it! There is nothing that can

stop you. You are an immortal child of God, and all the difficulties that visit

you are meant only to stimulate you to higher achievements.

The Best Resolution—Give More Time to God

Choose which habits you are going to destroy in the New Year. Make up

your mind about them and stick to your decision. Resolve to give more time

to God: to meditate regularly every day, and on one night each week to

meditate several hours, so that you can feel your spiritual progress in God.

Resolve that you are going to practice Kriya Yoga regularly and that you are

going to control your appetites and emotions. Be a master! Make up your

mind strongly now.

Think of the good resolutions you have made in the past—that you were not

going to be dictated to by your old habits and thoughts. But have you kept

them? It is an insult to your soul and to God to give in to your weaknesses.

Be master of yourself, captain of your destiny. Danger and you were born

together, and you are the elder brother, more dangerous than danger! Do not

lose the courage and determination that you feel as you listen to me now.

Pray with me:

“Heavenly Father, give us the strength to carry out all our good resolutions

in the New Year. May we always please Thee by our actions. Our spirits are

willing. Help us to materialize all our worthy wishes in the New Year. We

will reason, we will will, we will act; but guide Thou our reason, will, and

activity to the right thing that we should do in everything. Aum. Peace.

Amen.”

1 Autobiography of a Yogi.

2 Swami Ram Tirtha.

3 John 7:46.

4 Bhagavad Gita XII:13–14.

5 The annual Self-Realization Fellowship all-day Christmas meditation.

(See footnote 6 in “Making Religion Scientific.”)

How to Outwit Temptation

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, November 15, 1934

Satan, or cosmic delusion, is always snaring us through our ignorance. That

is how he obstructs God. The Lord could easily destroy Satan, but prefers to

overcome him by love. Whenever we choose the divine offerings of eternal

joy instead of the passing pleasures of the senses, the Adversary is robbed

of his dark power. So it is up to us to cooperate with our Heavenly Father,

that the Devil may be vanquished.

Whenever you are slothful and careless, you help Satan to pull you toward

his side. Jesus prayed: “Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from

evil.”1 Temptation is not our own creation; it belongs to the world of maya,

and all men are subject to it. But to enable us to free ourselves, God gave us

reason, conscience, and will power.

To give our approval to sinful activities is to find ourselves in trouble.

When by our wrong thoughts we fall into the pit of error, we should pray:

“Father, leave us not here, but pull us out through the force of our reason

and will. And when we are out, if it is Thy will to test us further, first make

Thyself known to us—that we may realize that Thou art more tempting than

temptation.”

So long as you feel unwilling to deny yourself some particular pleasure that

is detrimental to your welfare, you are in the region of Satan; the evil results

of succumbing to harmful sense lures will at one time or another overtake

you. But if you are convinced that temptation is dangerous to you because it

promises happiness and in the end gives sorrow, you can outwit the Devil.

Why Sense Experiences Are Alluring

Temptations are alluring; there is no doubt about that. Our sensory powers

are all directed to the outer world. There is a current of life energy flowing

from the brain through the nerves into the eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and skin.

The sensations we experience through these instruments are the result of

this outward-flowing current, and we tend to like the feeling. That is the

appeal of the senses. Overindulging them is dangerous; until a man is

established in wisdom, the outgoing energy leads him into sense bondage.

By the five-rayed searchlight of the senses, we perceive and explore the

world of matter. Through the senses we learn to like things that are pleasing

to see, hear, smell, taste, and touch. The desire for a particular sensation

becomes a habit. The trouble is, most people have not had any experience

of the Spirit, which is hidden behind matter; hence they have no standard of

comparison between the exciting, pleasurable perceptions of the senses and

the unknown ineffable bliss of the soul. And there is no chance to compare

until one has renounced or become mentally insusceptible to all sense

enticements. The only way to avoid the trap is to realize by reason or

experience that there are higher joys.

Habit Is a Pitiless Dictator

Commandments to refrain from harmful experiences are generally futile.

Whenever you order a person not to do something, he immediately wants to

do it. The taste of forbidden fruits is sweet in the beginning, but in the end,

bitter. Yet no matter how much suffering people experience, they go on

doing the same self-harming things. Once you have established a liking for

a certain sensory experience, the habit sits like a dictator in the brain and

commands you to indulge yourself, even though it is against your best

interests. You don’t want to repeat an act, and yet you do it. Try never to let

yourself reach a point where you become such a victim of wrong habits.

You must be the master of yourself; do not let any habit control you.

Whenever the desire for a particular sensory experience becomes habitual,

it is time to stop that practice.

I used to be fond of ginger ale because it reminded me of our lemonade in

India. Some students arranged to have this beverage on hand for me

wherever I went. One day I found my supply was all gone, and I missed it.

“Mr. Ginger Ale,” I said, “you have gone too far, and I hadn’t even realized

it! Goodbye.” The next day I purposely drank a little ginger ale as a test,

and it tasted terrible. My thought of the previous day had been so strong

that the desire was banished immediately.

I never miss anything that is taken away from me or that I voluntarily give

up. No physical comfort can bind me. I have tried it out. You must be able

to pass through all experiences of life without attachment. Lord Krishna

said: “The man of self-control, roaming among material objects with

subjugated senses, and devoid of attraction and repulsion, attains an

unshakable inner calmness.”2 Any time you have to have something—a

soft bed, a pillow, or whatever—remember that you are putting yourself

into slavery; and when your will and discrimination are held captive by

binding sense attachments, you will lose the infinite kingdom of God. Jesus

is still enjoying the transcendental ecstasy that he experienced when he

resurrected himself in the Lord. But those who exist in ignorance, subject to

the pressures of desires, will continue that way life after life until they resist

worldly seductions.

You should be careful not to let anything hurt your true happiness.

Corroding emotions of anger, greed, and jealousy, and overstimulation by

sex, alcohol, or drugs are extremely detrimental to you, for they prevent the

realization of soul joy. Never abuse the sensory powers by overindulgence,

if you would be really happy. “Ever fed, never satisfied; never fed, ever

satisfied” is a true axiom about unwholesome sense experiences.

Wisdom Is Man’s Best Protection

Protect yourself within the fortress of wisdom. There is no greater safety.

Complete understanding will bring you to a point where nothing can hurt

you. But until you have attained wisdom, when temptation comes you must

first stop the action or urge, and then reason. If you try to reason first, you

will be compelled in spite of yourself to do the thing that you don’t want to

do, because temptation will overcome all reason. Just say “No!” and get up

and go away. That is the surest way to escape the Devil. The more you

develop this “won’t” power during the intrusion of temptation, the happier

you will be; for all joy depends on the ability to do that which conscience

tells you you should do.

Don’t let your environment and sensory desires control you. Virtue and

spiritual living are far more charming than sensual indulgence, but the habit

chains of temptation hold people fast. If the Lord once tempted you with

His love, you would want nothing more. Nothing else would interest you.

When you are convinced that He is the most desirable Treasure, nothing on

the material plane can ever again tempt you and overcome your power of

discrimination.

To know God is the only worthwhile ambition to have, because He is

happiness everlasting. We should want Him because He is the panacea for

all our suffering. He is the answer to all our needs. The very things that our

hearts cry for—love, fame, wisdom, everything else—we find in

communion with that Complete One. Even if you are the most famous man

in the world, death will be the end of your awareness of fame; you will not

know then that people adore you. But Jesus is aware that his devotees love

him; because his consciousness is one with the consciousness of God

manifesting throughout creation, the Christ Intelligence, omnipresent,

omniscient, ever living.

So why strive hard to have something you will lose just as you cross the

portals of the grave? Money, fame, prestige, sense indulgence, material

comfort—these are all pseudo pleasures, offered by Satan in place of the

real joy of divine communion. Remember that temptation is powerful only

because you have no sense of comparison with anything better. When you

are strongly tempted, your wisdom is momentarily a prisoner of your

desires and habits. But the highest way to freedom is to be so merged in the

inexhaustible joy of God that you are able to relinquish all worldly

pleasures in an instant.

If you find true joy in this life, you will have it now and in the afterlife too.

Which do you want: God’s eternal bliss, which may be yours by denying

yourself a few pleasures now? or worldly happiness now, which will not

last? Convince your heart by comparison. Every effort that you make to

climb upward will be recognized by God.

Even If You Are the Greatest Sinner, Forget It

Don’t think of yourself as a sinner. You are a child of the Heavenly Father.

No matter if you are the greatest sinner, forget it. If you have made up your

mind to be good, then you are no longer a sinner. “Even a consummate

evildoer who turns away from all else to worship Me exclusively may be

counted among the good, because of his righteous resolve. He will fast

become a virtuous man and obtain unending peace. Tell all assuredly, O

Arjuna, that My devotee never perishes!”3 Start with a clean slate and say:

“I have always been good; I was only dreaming that I was bad.” It is true:

evil is a nightmare and does not belong to the soul.

Temptation is sugarcoated poison; it tastes delicious, but death is certain.

The happiness that people look for in this world does not endure. Divine joy

is eternal. Yearn for that which is lasting, and be hardhearted about rejecting

the impermanent pleasures of life. You have to be that way. Don’t let the

world rule you. Never forget that the Lord is the only reality. The real love

of your Cosmic Father is playing hide-and-seek with you in your heart.

Your true happiness lies in your experience of Him.

Man is sunk in a dream of ignorance, imagining that he is suffering with

illness and sorrow and poverty. Once when King Janaka, a great Indian

saint, was deep in prayer, he suddenly exclaimed, “Who is in my temple

today? I thought it was myself, but I see the Eternal is there. And the little

self, this body-bundle of bones, is not I. It is the Infinite that is in my body.

I bow to Myself. I offer flowers to Myself.” Someday that realization will

come to you, and you will no longer think you are a mortal, a man or a

woman; you will know that you are a soul, made in the divine image, “and

that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you.”4

The soul is bound to the body by a chain of desires, temptations, troubles,

and worries, and it is trying to free itself. If you keep tugging at that chain

which is holding you to mortal consciousness, someday an invisible Divine

Hand will intervene and snap it apart, and you will be free.

Protect yourself against temptation and sorrow by reason and by

communion with God. In the Bhagavad Gita the Lord says: “The ignorant,

oblivious of My transcendental nature as the Maker of all creatures,

discount also My presence within the human form.”5 Meditation is simply

reminding yourself again and again that you are not the limited physical

body, but the Infinite Spirit. Meditation is arousing the memory of your real

Self and forgetting what you imagine you are. If a drunken prince goes into

the slums and, forgetting entirely his true identity, begins lamenting, “How

poor I am,” his friends will laugh at him and say, “Wake up, and remember

that you are a prince.”

You have been likewise in a state of hallucination, thinking you are a

helpless mortal, struggling and miserable. Every day you should sit quietly

and affirm, with deep conviction: “No birth, no death, no caste have I;

father, mother, have I none. Blessed Spirit, I am He.6 I am the Infinite

Happiness.” If you again and again repeat these thoughts, day and night,

you will eventually realize what you really are: an immortal soul.

Fix Your Mind in the Divine Consciousness of Meditation

Temptation, greed, attachment to people and possessions, slavery to the

senses, ignorance of your Spirit-nature, idleness, and mechanical living are

the worst enemies of your happiness. Be busy working, with your mind

fixed in the divine consciousness that is cultivated by meditation, for then

you will be really happy and you will be really living.

When I started meditating, I could not imagine that I would ever find such

joy in it. But as time went on, the more I meditated, the greater became my

peace and bliss.

If you are getting tired of the life you are leading, and yet you go on filling

it with more possessions and more desires for new experiences, you are on

the wrong road. The surest way to avoid temptation is to lead a natural life:

a life in harmony with God. Don’t lead an unnatural existence, restlessly

seeking happiness from a world that is powerless to bestow it. Life is too

precious. Every day I pray to Him: “Take everything away from me if it is

Your desire. I am trying to do my best, Father, but know this for certain:

above all I want to please You. I will try to please others, too, but more than

anything else I want to please You.” When you pray like that you may

suffer many tests of desires. But as you go on fighting wrong habits and

tendencies, He begins gradually to come upon you; finally you will see that

like a great flood He has swept away all your undesirable traits.

Krishna said: “The man who physically fasts from sense objects finds that

the sense objects fall away for a little while, leaving behind only the

longing for them. But he who beholds the Supreme is freed even from

longings.”7 Banish all darkness by His light, and evil thoughts by good

thoughts. Eliminate temptation by discovering God’s superior attraction in

meditation. That is the best weapon against temptation. Any time you feel

that your will is being overpowered, meditate until you feel the Divine

Presence.

1 Matthew 6:13.

2 Bhagavad Gita II:64.

3 Bhagavad Gita IX:30–31.

4 I Corinthians 3:16.

5 IX:11.

6 From a famous song by Swami Shankara, peerless exponent of Vedic

monism. (See Swami Shankara in glossary.)

7 Bhagavad Gita II:59.

Curing Mental Alcoholics

Circa 1949

The individual who drinks too much forms a pernicious habit. If he makes

no effort to curb his indulgence in liquors, he may become an alcoholic and

helplessly suffer from an overwhelming desire to drink without any limit,

without rhyme or reason. Such unfortunate people often spend all their

money on drink; they eat very little and seem to get some nourishment from

the liquor itself. The normal sense of responsibility toward maintaining

good health and an honorable standing in the family, society, and the world

is lost. They may eventually lose all sense of pride and be picked up dead

drunk anywhere—in a ditch, or in the middle of the street—exposed

meanwhile to the dangers of being robbed or run over.

The foregoing description of liquor alcoholics serves to illustrate what I

mean by “mental alcoholics.” The latter may be individually classified

according to their particular psychological extreme, which might be chronic

anger, fear, sex, sadism, gambling, stealing, jealousy, hate, greed, moods,

craftiness, or stupidity.

When from the very beginning of life a person displays extraordinary

tantrums of anger, fear, jealousy—or any other of the aforementioned

characteristics—then one may know that he has acquired those abnormal

mental habits in a previous existence.

Parents who notice any such evil psychological tendencies in their child,

even in its infancy, should get busy and take some steps to prevent the child

from becoming a psychological alcoholic; if possible, by placing him in

another environment under the good care of spiritual teachers.

Through continued good company and proper environment for many years,

a mental alcoholic may become free from the octopus grip of the inborn

evil. While the mental alcoholic is receiving thoughtful care in a good

environment, the evil consequences of his bad habits should be explained to

him, and he should be encouraged to reason with himself about them and to

make a distinct effort not to display them under any circumstances. Each

indulgence in a prenatally acquired mental habit makes it stronger and

stronger, until the possessor becomes literally a slave to it.

A False Conception

The angry man, the sexual man, the greedy man forgets his own position,

and his relations with society, and commits great blunders that ruin his life

and the lives of others. Many of these mental alcoholics think that if they

give expression to their psychological habits, they will feel somewhat

relieved. But the self-indulgent habit of giving in to harmful impulses is

extremely pernicious, for it is by repetition of such evil expressions that a

person becomes a chronic mental alcoholic, making a fool of himself

anytime and anywhere.

If children are exposed to an evil environment while their minds are in a

plastic state, they will develop wrong habits that, unchecked, may lead to

chronic mental alcoholism. Parents who notice a sudden change in a child

—perhaps a calm-natured boy suddenly turns into a repeatedly angry boy—

should immediately take care of this. The causes of his frustrations should

be determined and removed, and new avenues for constructive use of his

energies sought.

Those who habitually display any of the foregoing traits are mental

alcoholics. They recklessly ride down the Niagara Falls of continuous bad

habits, smashing their happiness to pieces as they helplessly but willingly

indulge in uncontrolled expression of their worst traits. It is not good to

remonstrate with mental alcoholics who frequently display violent moods of

disgust and boredom with the world. Their attitude is a result of their

continuous repetition of wrong habits. They should be treated as

psychological patients suffering from chronic mental diseases.

Counteractive Influences

A change of company is the best remedy for acute mental alcoholism of any

kind, for the will of the mental alcoholic has become a slave to habit; hence

he has no resistance whatsoever to evil. The most effective cure is to move

him immediately to an environment that will be a specific antidote to his

toxic mental condition.

If possible, the angry mental alcoholic should be placed with one or more

individuals who do not become angry, even under irritating circumstances.

The sexual person ought to be surrounded by self-controlled people; the

habitual thief needs the society of honest people. The chronically timid can

be helped by association with the brave, and by reading stories of men who

were heroes. Moody or scornful or “sourpuss” types should have the

companionship of habitually cheerful people.

A mental alcoholic should remember that poor elimination, and eating meat

(beef and pork especially), will aggravate his psychological malady, fixing

it even more firmly in his brain. An abundance of fruits and vegetables in

the daily diet, and each week a one-day fast on fruit juices—with a longer

fast occasionally—will greatly help to change the cerebral grooves that

entrench the pernicious habits.

Sexual excess impairs the nervous system and the brain cells, which in turn

aggravates anger in a mental alcoholic. Overindulgence in sex destroys will

power, also. Hence all mental alcoholics should learn control over the sex

impulse, that they may practice moderation in marital relations, as nature

intended.

Petty Dictators

Often we find that the breadwinners in a family—father or son or,

sometimes, mother or daughter—display a tendency toward mental

alcoholism because of the consciousness that they are in a position to

dictate. Such little dictators in families should not freely unload their moods

on innocent, harmless dependents, and thus lose the inner respect of those

around them. When a family dictator thinks he can get away with doing

what he pleases at home, he gradually begins to do what he pleases in

expressing unpleasant moods or evil traits outside the family. Eventually he

does this anytime and anywhere. If petty family tyrants don’t check their

indulgence in these sadistic habits, they gradually become mental

alcoholics, behaving immaturely and causing untold trouble to those who

are closely or even casually associated with them, as well as to themselves.

If you are a mental alcoholic, try to cure yourself; but meanwhile refrain at

least from trying to infect or influence others. For whether or not you

succeed, you will probably cause yourself added trouble. Think what

pandemonium would break loose if suddenly somebody dropped a skunk in

your peaceful home, where you had been sitting quietly meditating or

reading a book by the fireplace. You and those around you would no doubt

try to evict the skunk, and in so doing be drenched with its malodorous

chemicals. Both the family and the skunk would suffer.

So it is not wise for a human skunk to enter an environment where he is

unwanted. He is likely to cause trouble for everyone around him, and in the

end may suffer harsh treatment. Please remember that a human skunk

carrying a mental vibration of terrible moods, and the reflection of it on his

face, creates incalculable harm in peaceful environments; this biped is

unwanted anywhere.

It is better even to hide mental alcoholism than to give in to its influence in

public. Continued shameless indulgence is the soil in which prenatal or

postnatal tendencies thrive. The individual who is prenatally disposed to

mental alcoholism must be doubly careful not to live in an environment that

waters the innate psychological seeds of his bad habits or moods.

Of course, when you meet a person who treats you formally, and with a

galvanized smile says, “How do you do, I am awfully delighted to see you,”

while inside he is thinking, “I could cheerfully chop off your head for

disturbing me,” you sense his inner feeling and you don’t like it. I myself

like to know where I stand with people. I prefer blunt treatment to

hypocritical behavior. No one likes to risk having the snake of insincerity

dart out at him from under a rosebush of smiles.

However, it is better for a mental alcoholic to be friendly toward people,

even if hypocritically, than to vent on them his evil moods. Self-control

practiced daily, even in insignificant matters, will help the mental alcoholic

to come out of his drunken indulgences little by little.

Overcoming Malignant Moods

First Self-Realization Fellowship Temple at Encinitas, California, March 5,

1939

Moods are not easily defined; but you know what they are. When you are in

a mood, your behavior is not natural; you are not the person you should be.

The end result is that you feel wretched. And how foolish it is to be

unhappy through your own doing! Nobody likes misery. Why not analyze

yourself next time you are in a mood? You will see how you are willingly,

willfully making yourself miserable. And while you are doing so, others

around you feel the unpleasantness of your state of mind. Wherever you go,

you tell about yourself without speaking, because your whole mood carries

its vibrations in your eyes, and anyone looking at you is aware of the

negativity recorded there. Seeing the dark feelings reflected in your eyes,

others are repelled; they want to stay away from those discomforting

vibrations. You must remove moods from your mental mirror before you

can remove their reflection from your eyes.

We Live in a Glass House

You are living in the glass house of this world, and everyone else is

watching you. You cannot pose; you have to live a natural life. So why not

behave in such a way that others will look up to you? Why should they not

see joy in your face? All your good qualities are covered up inside by your

moodiness.

Not only are others observing how you conduct yourself; you also are

studying how they behave. Because you tend to make comparisons as a

result of constantly watching those around you, you fall into moods. Or you

may become moody over the endless difficulties one encounters in this

world. Moods are often a result of environmental influences. Each one of us

is affected in different ways by the world about us. But you should not

allow yourself to indulge in moods over external conditions. Why should

you take on the effects of your environment? There are people who resort to

moods in an attempt to avoid facing some problem. But moodiness is

neither an escape nor an emotional safety valve. It is natural now and then

to fall momentarily into a mood; but don’t hold on to it!

Each type of mood has a specific cause, and it lies within your own mind.

To remove a mood you must remove its cause. One should introspect each

day in order to understand the nature of his mood, and how to correct it, if it

is a harmful one. Perhaps you find yourself in an indifferent state of mind.

No matter what is suggested, you are not interested. It is necessary then to

make a conscious effort to create some positive interest. Beware of

indifference, which ossifies your progress in life by paralyzing your will

power.

Perhaps your mood is discouragement over sickness; a feeling that you will

never regain health. You must try to apply the laws of right living that lead

to a healthy, active, and moral life, and pray for greater faith in the healing

power of God.

Or suppose your mood is a conviction that you are a failure, and can never

succeed at anything. Analyze the problem and see if you have really made

all the effort you could have. Consider the hard work of the president of the

United States. He has to try to please all the forty-eight states,1 and other

nations as well. We have to marvel that it is possible for a man to

understand so much and undertake so much. And as there is such a

difference between the working capacity of the ordinary man and that of the

president, how much greater the difference between that of the president

and God, who is infinitely busier! God is managing the whole universe,

down to the most minute detail—and we are made in His image. Therefore

we cannot make excuses for failure to succeed. Don’t be afraid of hard

work; it has never hurt anyone. However, one should learn to work—and to

think—calmly. When you are calmly active you can accomplish anything

you set out to do, for the mind is clear.

In addition to not working hard enough for success, most people are not

mentally active enough. They spend too much time not thinking. It is

considered to be relaxation. However, in true relaxation one is calmly active

mentally; he may reflect about God, or about a beautiful peaceful scene, or

about some pleasant experience. Calm, positive mental activity is

revivifying. Yet many people wrongly associate creative effort with strain,

and go about it with a tense, nervous attitude.

Moods Get Their Grip on a Vacant Mind

Creative thinking is the best antidote for moods. Moods get their grip on

your consciousness when you are in a negative or passive state of mind.

The time when your mind is vacant is just the time it can become moody;

and when you are moody, the devil comes and wields his influence on you.

Therefore, develop creative thinking. Whenever you are not active

physically, do something creative in your mind. Keep it so busy that you

have no time to indulge in moodiness.

Creative thinking is marvelous—like living in another world. Everyone

should develop this power. I think hardly a word of my lecture before I

come here; but I get into the consciousness of my subject, and my soul

begins to tell me wonderful things. When you are thinking creatively, you

don’t feel the body or moods; you become attuned with Spirit. Our human

intelligence is made in the image of His creative intelligence, through

which all things are possible; and if we don’t live in that consciousness, we

become a bundle of moods. By thinking creatively we destroy those moods;

and by thinking creatively we will find all the answers to our problems, and

to the problems of others.

Moods are like cancer—they eat into the peace of the soul. That is why the

moody man cannot rid himself of his troubles. Remember: no matter how

wrong everything has gone for you, you have no right to be moody. In your

mind you can be a conqueror. When bested, the moody man admits defeat.

But the man whose mind remains unconquered, though the world be in

cinders at his feet, is yet the victor.

Do you want to be a prisoner or a conqueror? By binding yourself so tightly

in moods, you render yourself incapable of going on with the battle of life.

As soon as you allow a mood to enwrap your mind, your will becomes

paralyzed. Moods befog the brain, and hence impair judgment, so that your

efforts are wasted.

Moods Are the Brakes on Your Wheels of Progress

You can conquer your moods, no matter how terrible they seem. Make up

your mind that you are not going to be moody anymore; and if a mood

comes in spite of your resolve, analyze the cause that brought it on, and do

something constructive about it. Don’t go on doing things in a state of

indifference, if that is your attitude, for indifference is the worst of all

moods. At such times, remind yourself that you are not your own creator;

God created you, and He is running this universe for you. Whatever your

work, do it enthusiastically, for Him. Busy yourself in creative activities, for

He has given you infinite power. How dare you make yourself a mental

failure by indulgence in the intoxicant of moodiness! Free yourself from

these devastating mental states. They are the real brakes on the wheels of

your progress. Until you release them, you cannot move on. Every morning,

remind yourself that you are God’s child, and that no matter what the

difficulties, you have the power to overcome them. Heir to the cosmic

power of Spirit, you are more dangerous than danger!

An intelligent boy does not care to work on simple problems; he enjoys the

challenge of difficult ones. But many people are afraid of life’s problems. I

have never feared them, for I have always prayed: “Lord, may Thy power

increase in me. Keep me in the positive consciousness that with Thy help I

can always overcome my difficulties.” Think constructively about a

problem till you cannot think anymore. When I am solving a problem, I go

to the nth degree to cover all possible steps toward its solution, until I can

honestly say: “I have done my best, and that is all I can do.” Then I forget

it.

A person who keeps the worry of a problem in his consciousness becomes

moody. Avoid that. When a problem comes up, instead of dwelling on it,

think of every possible avenue of action to rid yourself of it. If you are

unable to think, compare your particular trouble with others’ similar

troubles, and from their experiences learn which ways lead to failure and

which ways lead to success. Choose those steps that seem logical and

practical, and then get busy implementing them. The whole library of the

universe is hidden within you. All the things you want to know are within

yourself. To bring them out, think creatively.

Magical Effect of Sincere Love

Moods blunt one’s feelings and understanding, making it impossible to get

along with others. Domestic life should be a temple of heaven, but moods

can make it a hades. A husband comes home and finds his wife in a sullen

mood, and he can’t reason with her. Or he returns from work in a nasty

mood, and she can’t reason with him. So much trouble comes to people

because of moods!

When someone else in your family is seething with anger, or is wholly

indifferent, you are affected immediately by his mood. Or perhaps you go to

someone in great joy, but he is moody and quarrelsome, and finally he gives

you a slap. Immediately your joy vanishes, and you want to retaliate. Do

not put on the mood of another. The Bible tells us that if anyone smites us

on the left cheek, we should turn the right cheek. How many do that? More

often, the person slapped wants to give his assailant twelve slaps in reprisal

—and perhaps a kick, or even a bullet! It is easy to strike back, but to give

love is the highest way to try to disarm your persecutor. Even if it doesn’t

work at the time, he will never be able to forget that when he gave you a

slap, you gave love in return. That love must be sincere; when it comes

from the heart, love is magical. You should not look for the effects; even if

your love is spurned, pay no attention. Give love and forget. Don’t expect

anything; then you will see the magical result.

Do you realize that within you, in your soul, is a superb garden? a

wondrous garden of thoughts, fragrant with love, goodness, understanding,

and peace, and more beautiful than any earthly flowers that grow. You

cultivated a fragrant blossom whenever someone in anger misunderstood

you and you continuously gave love to him. Isn’t the aroma of that love and

understanding more lasting than that of any rose? So always think of your

mind as a garden, and keep it beautiful and fragrant with divine thoughts;

let it not become a mud pond, rank with malodorous hateful moods. If you

cultivate the heavenly scented blooms of peace and love, the bee of Christ

Consciousness2 will steal into your garden. As the bee seeks out only those

flowers that are sweet with honey, so God comes only when your life is

sweet with honeyed thoughts. Resolve that in your garden of good soul

qualities you will not allow the evil stinkweed of anger to grow. The more

you develop flowerlike divine qualities, the more God will reveal to you

His secret omnipresence in your soul.

“He who is tranquil before friend and foe alike, and in encountering

adoration and insult, and during the experiences of warmth and chill and of

pleasure and suffering...that person is dear to Me.”3 By continuously giving

love to those who are unkind, peace to those who are harassed by worries,

sweetness to those who are bitter, joy to those who are laden with miseries;

and by constantly setting a better example for those who follow the path of

error, you destroy moods by keeping the mind creatively busy. If you can’t

be busy outwardly, be constructively busy inwardly.

Live in a World of Wonder

I often say: If you read for one hour, write for two hours; and if you write

for two hours, think for three hours; and if you think for three hours,

meditate all the time. God is the repository of all happiness; and you can

contact Him in everyday life. Yet man mostly occupies himself in pursuits

that lead to unhappiness. Meditation is the best way to destroy moods and

live in a world of wonder—a world such as Narada, a great rishi, knew

when he said: “Lord, I was singing Thy praises, and became lost in Thee.

When I came back to this consciousness, I saw that I had slipped from my

old body, and You had given me a new one!”

A similar story is told in India about another saint. A young man had just

died. His body had been carried to the cremation grounds and the mourners

were preparing to light the fire, when suddenly an old man came running,

crying out, “Stop! Don’t do it, I will use that body.” As soon as he said this,

the man’s aged body dropped lifeless to the ground, and the young man got

up from the pyre and ran off toward the forest. The old man was a great

saint; he had simply not wished to interrupt his devotions by taking rebirth

in an infant’s helpless body.

Fear Enters When God Is Shut Out of Life

There are so many wondrous things to know about life and death, and

meditation is the way. Learn to live in this world as a son of God. Death

holds terror for man because he has left God out of his life. All painful

things frighten us, because we love the world without understanding its

mystery and purpose. But when we behold everything as God, we have

nothing to fear. We are constantly “born” in life as well as death. The word

“death” is a great misnomer, for there is no death; when you are tired of life,

you simply take off the overcoat of flesh and go back to the astral world.4

Death means an end. A car whose parts are worn out is dead; it has come to

an end. And so at death the physical body comes to an end. But the

immortal soul cannot be dead. Every night, in sleep, the soul lives without

any consciousness of the physical body; but it is not dead. Death is only a

greater sleep, wherein the soul lives in the astral body without the

consciousness of the physical body. If loss of physical-body consciousness

signified death for man, then the soul would die when we go to sleep. But

we are not dead when we are asleep; nor are we completely unconscious,

because when we awaken, we remember whether we slept well or not. So,

in the after-state of death we do not die.

Those who allow their minds to ossify are truly dying. To solve the mystery

of life you must be born anew every day. This means you must strive daily

to improve yourself in some way. Above all, pray for wisdom, because with

wisdom everything else comes. Be controlled not by moods, but by

wisdom. And with that wisdom, develop creative thinking and activity.

Keep busy doing constructive things for your own self-improvement and

for the benefit of others, for whoever would enter God’s kingdom must try

also to do good for others every day. If you follow this pattern, you will feel

the mood-dispelling joy of knowing you are advancing, mentally,

physically, and spiritually. You will surely reach God, for that way leads to

the kingdom of heaven.

Strive continuously to overcome moods; for as soon as you feel moody, you

are cultivating seeds of error in the soil of your soul. To indulge in moods is

to die gradually; but if you try daily to be cheerful in spite of any upsetting

experiences, you will have a new birth. Until this human birth becomes

transmuted into a highly spiritual birth, you cannot be “born again”5 in

God.

Moods are “catching,” and at times of general depression can affect large

numbers of people. Man should not take life’s unhappy incidents so

seriously. It is better to laugh a little than to make a tragedy of every

misfortune. The Gita teaches: “He who feels neither rejoicing nor loathing

toward the glad nor the sad (aspects of phenomenal life), who is free from

grief and cravings, who has banished the relative consciousness of good and

evil, and who is intently devout—he is dear to Me.”6 To have an optimistic

disposition and try to smile is constructive and worthwhile; for whenever

you express divine qualities, such as courage and joy, you are being born

again; your consciousness is being made new by the manifestation of your

true soul nature. This is the spiritual rebirth that enables you to “see the

kingdom of God.”

1 Alaska and Hawaii were not yet states at the time Paramahansaji made

this observation. (Publisher’s Note)

2 God’s omnipresent intelligence, and the attractive force of His love,

manifested in creation.

3 Bhagavad Gita XII:18–19.

4 The Hindu scriptures state that the soul of man is encased successively in

three bodies: the idea or causal body, a subtle astral body, and a gross

physical body. The astral world is the subtle realm of finer forces to which

the soul, still encased in its causal and astral bodies, retires at physical death

to continue its spiritual education and evolution until it incarnates again on

earth. (See astral world in glossary.)

5 “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God....Ye

must be born again” (John 3:3, 7).

6 Bhagavad Gita XII:17.

Reincarnation Can Be Scientifically Proven

Circa 1926

If one believes in the existence of a just God, then a belief in reincarnation

can follow very readily, as the two concepts are really dependent on one

another. But what about the skeptics and the atheists? Can the truth of

reincarnation be scientifically proven to their satisfaction? Can the theory of

reincarnation be in any way scientifically experimented with, so as to

furnish not only hope, but actual proof, of its reality?

Material scientists claim that they have not found any actual proof of the

existence of a God, and hence cannot offer any proof of the existence of His

just law, giving equal opportunity to all life to improve through

reincarnation. To such scientists, the sufferings of innocent babies and other

inequities of life seem inexplicable, and point to the absence of a just

Creator.

Scientific Law

On the other hand, most of those who do believe in a just God base their

convictions on belief only, and have no scientific proof to offer to

unbelievers. They do not dare, for the most part, to scrutinize or deeply

question their faith, for fear of losing it or of creating some social

inharmony. They are not aware, in other words, of the existence of a

scientific spiritual law that can prove their beliefs to be truth.

But why should not spiritual law be investigated by the same methods of

experimentation used by the material scientist to discover physical truths?

This question was asked centuries ago by the Hindu savants, and they set

about the task of answering it. Their experiments resulted in scientific

methods that can be followed by anyone to discover the reality of spiritual

law, and hence of reincarnation and every other great cosmic truth.

Since the means of proof do exist, no one has a right to say that

reincarnation and other spiritual laws do not operate, until he has tried the

methods and seen the results for himself. A doubting physical scientist is

entitled to express his opinion, but it remains an opinion only, not a fact. In

physical science, certain procedures must be adopted and followed in order

to prove the truth of any given theory. Germs are not visible to the naked

eye; one must use a microscope to detect their presence. If a person refuses

to look through the microscope, he cannot be said to have scientifically

tested the theory that germs are present. His opinion is therefore valueless,

since he has not followed the prescribed rules for arriving at the truth of the

theory. So it is in spiritual matters. The method has been discovered, the

rules laid down, and the result is open to anyone who is interested enough

to experiment. In the Western world, owing to lack of this scientific

approach to spiritual law, the value of religion has been greatly diminished

as a vital factor in the life of man, and spiritual doctrines are believed in or

rejected simply on the grounds of personal bias, rather than as a result of

scientific investigation.

How Were the Spiritual Laws Discovered?

How did the spiritual scientists (rishis) of ancient India discover these

unalterable cosmic laws? Through experiment on the life and thought of

man, in the laboratories of their hermitages. To find the truth of physical

things, we must experiment with physical substances. So, to find the truth

of reincarnation, or the passage of the same soul through many bodies, it is

necessary to experiment upon the consciousness of man. These scientists of

old found that the human ego persists through all changes of experience and

thought during the states of wakefulness, dream, and dreamless sleep during

one’s lifetime. The cognitive experiences changed, the environment,

sensations, thoughts, and bodily states changed, but the sense of identity, of

“I,” did not change from birth to death. The Hindu experimentalists argued

that through concentration on the self, through a constant, conscious, aloof,

unidentified introspection or watching of the various changing states of life

—of wakefulness, dreaming, or dreamless sleep—that one could perceive

the changeless and eternal nature of the self. Ordinarily, one is conscious of

his waking state, and sometimes he is conscious also of his dreaming state.

It is not uncommon, during a dream, for a person to be aware that he is

dreaming. Through certain methods and practices, one can maintain

conscious awareness during every state of his being: wakefulness,

dreaming, dreamless sleep, and turiya, “deep sleep,” the ever awake

superconsciousness (the unrestricted region of mind) beyond dreamless

subconsciousness.

Relaxation in Sleep

During sleep, there is involuntary relaxation of energy from the motor and

sensory nerves. Through practice, one can produce this relaxation during

the waking state also, at will. In the big sleep of death, there is total

relaxation—the retirement of energy from the heart and cerebrospinal axis.

By deep meditation, this complete relaxation may be produced consciously

in the waking state. In other words, every involuntary function may be

accomplished voluntarily and consciously by practice.

The rishis of ancient India analyzed death as the withdrawal of the

electricity of life from the bulb of human flesh with its wires of sensory and

motor nerves that lead to the different channels of outward expression. Just

as electricity does not die when it is withdrawn from a broken bulb, so life

energy is not annihilated when it retires from the involuntary nerves.

Energy cannot die. It withdraws, upon the occasion of death, into the

Cosmic Energy.

Current Withdrawn

In sleep, the conscious mind ceases to operate—the current is temporarily

withdrawn from the nerves. In death, the human consciousness permanently

ceases to express itself through the body; it is as though one had a paralyzed

arm—he is mentally conscious of that arm, but cannot function through it.

Medical records describe the case of a clergyman who once fell into a state

of suspended animation. He heard everyone around bewailing his apparent

death, but could not express his awareness through his physical organs. His

body motor had “stalled” and refused to respond to his mental commands.

After he had passed twenty-four hours in this state, and was about to be

taken away for burial, he made a supreme effort and was able to move. This

instance illustrates the constancy of the awareness of “I-ness” or personal

identity, even though the body is seemingly lifeless.

The rishis taught that one must learn to separate the energy and

consciousness from the body, consciously. One must consciously watch the

state of sleep, and must practice conscious voluntary withdrawal of energy

from the heart and spinal regions. Thus he learns to do consciously what

death will otherwise force upon him unconsciously and unwillingly.1

An Amazing Case

There is a case on record, in the files of French and other European doctors,

of a man named Sadhu Haridas—in the court of Emperor Ranjit Singh of

India—who was able to separate his energy and consciousness from his

body and then connect the two again after several months. His body was

buried underground and watch was kept over the spot, day and night, for

months. At the end of this time, his body was exhumed and examined by

the European doctors, who pronounced him dead. After a few minutes,

however, he opened his eyes and regained control over all the functions of

his body; and lived for many years more. He had learned, by practice, how

to control all the involuntary functions of his body and mind. He was a

spiritual scientist who experimented with prescribed methods for learning

the truth of cosmic law. As a result he was in a position to demonstrate the

truth of the theory of the changelessness of personal identity and the eternal

nature of the life principle.

Those who want to prove for themselves the scientific truth of the doctrine

of reincarnation should first prove the principle of continuity of

consciousness after death by learning the art of consciously separating the

soul from the body.2 This can be done by following the rules laid down

many centuries ago by the Hindu savants: Learn (1) to be conscious during

sleep, (2) to be able to produce dreams at will, (3) to disconnect the five

senses consciously, not passively as during sleep, and (4) to control the

action of the heart, which is to experience conscious death, or the

suspended animation of the body (but not of the consciousness) that occurs

during the higher states of superconsciousness.

Follow the Practices

Bhagavan Krishna taught: “The ego is continuously conscious of itself in

childhood, youth, and old age; the embodied soul is uninterruptedly

conscious not only of these states but also of attaining another body after

death (in the long series of ‘lives’ and ‘deaths’ that are the ego’s

alternations between the physical and astral worlds).”3

By following the practices that lead to the four states outlined above, we

can follow the ego in all states of existence—we can follow it consciously

through death, through space, to other bodies or other worlds. Those who

do not learn these things cannot retain their sense of personal identity, of

awareness or consciousness, during the big sleep of death, and hence cannot

remember any previous state, or even the “deep sleep” states during one

life.

By adopting the methods of the ancient Hindu scientists who experimented

with such laws, and who thereby gave the world a knowledge that is

priceless and demonstrable, one may come to know the scientific truth of

reincarnation and all other eternal verities.

1 The life energy enters the body at the medulla, is stored in the reservoir of

the cerebrum, and then descends into five other centers of life and

consciousness in the spine, whence it is distributed to the organs of sensory

perceptions and to all other parts of the body. At death, the life energy

retires irrevocably into the spine and leaves the body through the medulla.

The accomplished yogi can voluntarily and consciously withdraw the life

energy from the body and senses into the spine, directing it upward to the

highest centers of divine perceptions, where he is joyously aware of being

“dead”—freed from sensory delusions of being limited to a purely physical

existence.

2 The Christian mystic St. Paul understood and demonstrated this mastery

of life and death; he declared: “...I die daily” (I Corinthians 15:31).

3 Bhagavad Gita II:13.

Reincarnation: The Soul’s Journey to Perfection

Self-Realization Fellowship Temple, Hollywood, California, February 20,

1944

Reincarnation is the progress of a soul through many lives on the earth

plane, as through so many grades in a school, before it “graduates” to the

immortal perfection of oneness with God. Souls that are living in an

imperfect state (unaware of their divine identity with Spirit) do not, upon

the death of the physical body, automatically enter a state of God-

realization. We are made in the image of God, but by identification with the

physical body, we have put on its imperfections and limitations. Until this

imperfect human consciousness of mortality is removed, we cannot become

gods again.

A prince ran away from his palatial home and sought shelter in a slum. As a

result of intoxication and of mixing with persons of bad character, he

gradually lost sight of his true identity. Not until his father found him and

took him home to the palace did he remember that he was actually a prince.

Similarly, we are all children of the King of the Universe who have run

away from our spiritual home. We have kept ourselves locked up in human

bodies for so long that we have forgotten our divine heritage. As often as

we have come on earth we have developed new imperfections and new

desires. So we come back here again and again until we fulfill all desires; or

until, through increase of wisdom, we banish those desires. We must satisfy

our desires, or, by cultivating wisdom, do away with them altogether. Very

few persons get off the wheel of birth and death by trying to satisfy their

desires, however; it is the nature of desire that each time one “satisfies” it,

the craving to repeat the experience simply increases its hold, unless one’s

mind is very strong.1

It is better to satisfy small or unimportant desires, because in that way we

can get rid of them. But it is necessary to do so with wisdom and

discrimination; otherwise even small desires may come back in a stronger

way, reinforced by experience. People who feel a desire to drink, for

example, often “reason” thus: “I will have all I want today, and tomorrow I

will do without.” After several repetitions of this experience, the usual

result is that they find they have instilled a habit, and then it is difficult to

get rid of it. The same thing may happen with any other desire.

God is not a dictator who has sent us here and is telling us what to do. He

has given us free will to do as we please. We hear a great deal about the

importance of being good. But if we all go straight to heaven when we die

(as some claim), what is the point in trying to do good while we are here? If

there is the same reward for everyone at the end of life, why not be a

greedy, selfish person, since the path of evil is often the easiest one to take?

There would be no use in emulating the lives of great saints if when we die

we all—the good and the bad alike—become angels.

On the other hand, if God has it in His plan for us all to go to Hades, again

there would be no use in worrying about how we behave in this life. And

would there be any value in watching one’s actions if our lives are like

automobiles—once they become old they are cast on the junk pile and that

is the end of them? If that is all there is to man’s life there is no point in

reading the scriptures or in exercising self-control.

The Importance of Time

If, however, there is a lofty purpose in living, how may we explain the

seeming injustice in a baby’s being born dead? What about those who are

born blind or dumb or crippled; or who live only a few years and then die?

Only the one who lives long has time to struggle against innate wrong

tendencies and desires, and to try to be good. If there is no other chance (in

a future life) for the little child who dies at six months, why did God give

that child a mind and no time in which to develop the potentialities of that

mind? The time element is most important in our progress. One life-span

only may not afford sufficient time.

If a child dies early in life, there is a reason for that death; and because he

did not have enough time in which to express his potential, human or

divine, he will be given another opportunity in which to do so. Such a

person is like a boy who is sick and cannot go to school. The boy does not

leave school forever; as soon as he is well he goes back to school to start his

lessons where he left off. So it is with life. If we don’t have a chance to

learn our lessons in this life, we shall have opportunities to learn them in

some other.

When you can see “behind the scenes” you will realize that life on earth is a

puppet show. It seems real to us now, but what we are experiencing at this

moment will have a dreamlike unreality to us a few years hence. And what

we are experiencing now would have seemed unreal to us five years ago,

had it been described to us then. Last Sunday most of you sat in other seats

in the temple, and had other thoughts in your mind. Today we are seeing a

different “picture show.” Reflect on how many people you have known who

are now vanished from this earthly stage.

The concept of life as a changing, passing show is not pessimistic; it should

teach us not to take life seriously at all. Maya, cosmic delusion, makes us

feel that the body is so real, such a necessary part of our being. Yet in a

moment the body may be taken away from the soul by death, and the

separation is not painful at all. When that “operation” is over, you have no

need of time, dress, food, or shelter, for you no longer have to carry this

bodily bundle of flesh. You are free of it. And you are still you. Have you

ever sought to reason out why this truth is hidden? Or where may be now

the millions of people who have gone away from our earth? Have you ever

wondered if we are like so many chickens in a coop—when we are gone

from the coop we are replaced by another flock? Is there no way to find

out?

How We Live This Life Determines What We Are in the Next

We have been given the power to reason out where we go and whence we

have come. But we don’t take enough pains to analyze ourselves and our

lives. Otherwise our common sense would tell us that whatever our

character is today it will continue to be after death—perhaps a little better

or a little worse, depending on how much effort we are making to improve

ourselves. You go along 365 days a year, year after year, and perhaps you

have made some progress; but your nature will be the same after death as it

was before death. You will not become an angel just because you die! Only

the body changes. Death makes no difference, otherwise. Death is like a

gate you will pass through. Your body will be gone but you will be in every

other respect the same. If you have a violent temper, you will not leave it

behind, at death, with your physical body. Your violent temper will remain

with you until you conquer it. If in your present life you have observed the

laws of healthful living, in your next incarnation you will possess a healthy

body. The last portion of life is more important than the first, because what

you are at the end of this life is what you will be at the beginning of the

next.

The first part of life is usually stupidly misspent, in a sort of bewildered

state. Then romance comes, and finally disease and old age; the struggle

with the body starts. I have coined a phrase, “patchwork living,” to describe

how one has to keep on patching and repatching the body to keep it going.

The body is a trouble most of the time: a “spark plug” is missing, or the

“tires” give out; you have headaches or a cold, or the stomach goes wrong;

there is difficulty with the teeth, and so on. Always trouble, trouble! That is

why it is so necessary to your happiness that you realize you are not the

body, with all its aches and pains, but an immortal soul.

I don’t take life seriously at all. I say, “Lord, anytime you want to remove

this body from the soul, it is all right. So long as you keep me here, all

right; but if I am to be free of the body, that is all right too.” It is not

necessary to die in order to claim freedom from attachment to the body. If

you commune with God you will see that you are already free. You are not

the body. You are eternal Spirit.

Is there any way to find out what we were in our last incarnation? Most

certainly we can detect basic tendencies of thought and capabilities, by

analyzing what we are now. The Hindu scriptures say that it takes a million

years of harmonious, disease-free living for the soul to be liberated.

Therefore, comparatively little change is to be expected in the ordinary man

from life to life. But one’s spiritual evolution may definitely be hastened by

determined effort in right living and by the help of a true guru.

The sages of India have analyzed mankind as belonging to four basic types:

the Sudras, those capable of offering service to society through bodily

labor; the Vaisyas, those who serve through mentality, skill, agriculture,

trade, commerce, business life in general; the Kshatriyas, those whose

talents are administrative, executive, and protective—rulers and warriors;

and the Brahmins, those of contemplative nature, spiritually inspired and

inspiring.

Qualitatively, Sudras are those who see in life no greater purpose than the

satisfaction of wants and desires of the body; such persons eat, sleep, work,

multiply, and finally die. Millions today live life in the Sudra or “laborer”

state—concerned merely with the comfort and pleasure of the body.

The man in the Vaisya or mentally active state is always busy getting things

done. Some people of this class think of nothing else but business; they live

only to earn money, which they usually squander on sense enjoyments. But

the best Vaisya type of businessman is much more evolved and creative in

nature.

The third or Kshatriya class are those who, after having had the experience

of earning money and of creating something along business lines, begin to

understand what life is all about; they strive by self-control to win the battle

with the senses. (The Vaisya man doesn’t engage himself in such effort for

inner improvement. He simply earns money and produces children and

seldom thinks about the meaning of life except in terms of business.) But

the third or Kshatriya class takes life more seriously. Such a man asks

himself, “Should I not struggle with and destroy my bad habits?” He feels a

desire to overcome evil tendencies and to do what is right.

The last and highest state is that of the Brahmin: knower of Brahma or

God.2

Analyze Yourself to See How You Should Change

To recapitulate the four basic types of consciousness in man: Sudra is the

sense-bound state of existence; Vaisya is the business or creative stage of

man. Kshatriya is the warrior state, when man desires to do battle with his

senses and to conquer his attachment to them. Brahmin is the wisdom state,

attained by man when he has overcome all attachment to the senses and

remains consciously immersed in Brahma, God.

Every human being fits into one of these four classifications, and if you

analyze yourself you can find your class. Think over your life from

childhood days and try to reason out in which of the four classifications you

belong. Reflect on whether you have been living for sense pleasures, only

catering to the senses and earning money; or perhaps just working without

thinking or acting creatively.

Analyze yourself and see if you have been creative from your childhood.

Some children, for example, think readily along mechanical lines, and want

to open up and take apart things so that they can put them together again.

Others show the greatest pleasure in drawing, or in playing or listening to

music. It is not necessary to be an expert or a prima donna in order to

consider that one has shown signs of creativity in this life. Even a

nonsensical song such as “Yes, We Have No Bananas” is a product of a

creative mind.

Anything one creates, whether it is expertly done or not, is an expression of

creative talent. A flair for writing novels or for acting or for woodcarving or

for painting or for music or for working with machinery, if exhibited early

in life, indicates that you were probably in the Vaisya state in your past life.

Husbands and wives should not ridicule each other’s or their children’s

creative tendencies. It is a sin against the evolutionary process of God to try

to suppress another’s creative spirit.

Ask yourself if from childhood you have always tried to perform actions in

accordance with the guidance of your conscience. Were you constantly

watching your actions and trying to correct yourself when you were wrong?

Did you have that struggle within from childhood? That reflects the third or

Kshatriya state. But if from childhood your thoughts have always been of

God, you have entered the fourth or spiritual state of the Brahmin.

Recognition of your belonging to one of the less advanced of these four

types of mental attitude should not discourage, but encourage you. If upon

self-analysis you find that you have not yet attained to the highest state, do

not think yourself helplessly unfortunate. The idea is that if you haven’t

changed yet, it is now time that you should. Otherwise you will carry your

present state into the next life too. When death comes you want to feel that

you have passed that particular “grade” of life, and that you are free to go

on to higher grades. Therefore you should change your life now. Analyze

yourself and learn what you were before. Then you can begin to remold

your life more ideally.

Learn to check your moods. The violent feelings you may experience in the

present were all created in the past. If it were not so, why is it that some

children are jealous from the very beginning, while others in the same

family are calm and loving? There are children who would strike you if you

were to tell them not to do a thing; others are quietly obedient. Another

child may steal. Why? These traits are simply outcroppings of prenatal

tendencies created in former lives.

I was once given a little baby to hold. I almost dropped it, for God suddenly

revealed to me that that baby had been a cruel murderer in a previous life.

But ordinarily, the past is a closely guarded secret. You may discover the

true details only if the Lord wishes you to know them.

Discern Between Inner Worth and Outer Position

Once, in New York, a woman who was helping with Self-Realization

Fellowship office work confided to me that she had met a marvelous man, a

“psychic,” who had told her wonderful things about herself, including the

revelation that in a former life she had been Mary, Queen of Scots. I did not

believe she had been that queen, and I silently uttered a little prayer that

God would banish her delusion.

A few days later a student came to see me and, with great excitement, said,

“I have just met a famous psychic (the same one the office worker had

mentioned), who told me that in a past life I was Mary, Queen of Scots.” I

asked the office worker to come into the room; and, placing the two

“queens” face to face, I asked, “Which one of you is the real Mary, Queen

of Scots?” The ladies, happily, realized their mistake—which was one of

undiscriminating credulity and of readiness to confuse true inner worth with

conspicuous outer position.

The truth is, we love to be flattered. Unscrupulous persons thus may take

advantage of us now and then. But who you were in a previous life and

whether or not you were important in the eyes of the world is of little

consequence. It is best to be born as a divine or Brahmin type, regardless of

worldly position. All of you have something of that divine type in you;

otherwise you would not be here this morning.

Exchange of Souls Between East and West

Out of millions of people, you have been drawn to this temple, because you

have had something to do with the Orient and its spiritual teachings before.

Now that you are an Occidental, outwardly, other Occidentals may laugh at

you for going to what may seem to them a “heathen” church. Those who

feel a prejudice against the East did not recently come from there; but those

who feel a leaning toward the East were probably born there in a recent past

life. By such indications one can distinguish Oriental and Occidental souls.

Did you from early childhood enjoy the fragrance of incense, and stories

and pictures of the East? Such inclinations would show that you had been

quite recently in contact with the Orient.

Many souls from the East have reincarnated now in America. Desiring

material perfection, they have been born here to enjoy the fulfillment of that

desire and to help encourage American spiritual ideals. Similarly, many

souls that formerly were born in America have since reincarnated in India

in order to benefit from her spiritual riches and to help India in the

development of the material side of her civilization. I hope that many of

you may go there to help India, and that many in India will come here to

serve in America. This world is God’s family. He is trying to improve all

nations. He has no preference for one over another.

Another test of your past is your preference for certain sensations. Some

people like heat all the time. They have become accustomed, in other lives,

to warm climates. Others like cold better, which shows that they had been

born in cold climates before. If you have always had a special feeling for

the mountains, or the sea, you may be certain you brought that attachment

from another life. There are people who become lonely if they are out of the

city, and cannot stand quiet places. That attitude too was cultivated in the

past.

Those who have a driving ambition throughout life were important men

before. To have that tendency and not develop it is to suppress oneself. In

the proper environment such a person could become a great man. There are

others who remain unsuccessful, no matter what they do to get ahead. This

indicates they have carried a failure tendency from the past. But they should

not give up the battle to overcome it. Such persons must conquer wrong

tendencies now or they will manifest those faults in the next incarnation.

George Eastman once told me that in the early years of his Kodak company

he offered stock for twenty-five cents a share; still it wouldn’t sell. The

family of the girl he wished to marry objected to the match. The adverse

circumstances were such that it seemed he would never become a success;

yet, after a while, everything opened up for him. Why? Because he had

been creative and ambitious before, and he kept on cultivating those

tendencies in this life.

From childhood I wished for large buildings and many people about me,

and for shady trees and water wherever I might go. And these are what I

attract. I also knew from childhood that I would have such things; that when

I wished and worked for it, these places would come easily to me. When I

talked about it, people sometimes laughed skeptically. Nevertheless, such

environments have materialized. At our Ranchi school we have a big pond;

our Dakshineswar headquarters faces the Ganges River; our Encinitas

hermitage overlooks the Pacific Ocean.3

So, through analysis of your present strong tendencies you can pretty

accurately surmise what kind of life you led before.

Past Associations Influence Present Affinities

You may find that you have a strong affinity to certain foreign languages

and that you are able to learn them quickly. Madame Galli-Curci, for

example, amazed me by the ease with which she learned many phrases in

Bengali. A love of certain languages is the result of past-life associations.

You are attracted to German or French or Chinese or Bengali because you

have spoken them before.

Recently I met a young American girl who told me, “I have never studied

any Oriental language, but lots of times I hear strange words in my mind. I

can say them, but I don’t know what they mean.” She forthwith said about

nine words in Bengali. She had never in this life studied the language, nor

had she known anyone who spoke Bengali. Yet she knew these words and

pronounced them correctly.

In traveling, you begin to like certain scenes more than others. If some

place stands out above all the rest in its attraction for you, you have

probably been in that vicinity before.

So by these various clues you may discover certain general ideas about your

past lives. From this point on, meditation can bring about a deeper

knowledge of what you were before.

Occasionally it happens that you go for the first time to a certain place

where you seem to recognize certain scenes; but the people whom you once

associated with those scenes are gone. And sometimes you meet people you

feel you knew before. With me, recognition has always been instant,

especially of those who had been disciples before.4

The following authentic case of remembrance of a past-life experience

became world famous. A little girl, born in a small village in India, began

inexplicably to pine away for a village in another part of India. Her

condition became so serious that a doctor advised that she be taken to the

distant village. This was done, and to the amazement of her companions,

from the moment she entered the outskirts of the village she began to

describe in detail everything in it. She knew people by their names

(although she had never before been to this village), and went directly to a

certain home where she called a man by name, saying that he had been her

brother in her previous life. Nor did she stop there. She explained that in her

past incarnation she had hidden some gold pieces in a brick wall of the

same house, but that she had died without ever having told anyone about it.

The little girl went to the place in the wall, and lo! the gold pieces were

there still. She described her clothes and how they had been packed away,

and they were found to be exactly as she had said. In the face of such

evidence, we are not justified in doubting the genuineness and significance

of her experience.

There is another case of a saint in India who went to a certain temple on a

riverbank and said: “My temple was near here. It is now in the river.”

Divers went down, and found under the water a very old temple. This man

had been, in a previous life, the saint to whom the now submerged temple

had been dedicated.

A Pure Heart—A Clear Insight

If you keep above the consciousness of sex, and make your heart pure, so

that when you look at others you will not be conscious of whether they are

men or women, you will be able always to recognize at once those souls

you have known before. If you have cultivated that impersonal

consciousness you can instantly recognize people you knew before.

Suppose you see a six-month-old baby, and then do not see it again until

many years have gone by and the baby has become a man. You probably do

not recognize that baby in the man. Yet certain features are the same, you

would discover, if you had known that baby long enough to fix those

features firmly in your mind. So, certain features of our past life remain

with us. The eyes especially will be like they were before. Eyes hardly

change because they are the windows of the soul. Those whose eyes reflect

anger or fear or wickedness should try to change, to remove unlovely

qualities that hide and hinder the expression of the beauty of the soul.

Owing to the change of environment and company, your mind and body

change somewhat. But the eyes change little. You are reborn with the same

expression in them.

You can also tell by your inclinations if you were a man or a woman in your

past existence. Many women are mannish, and many men want to be like

women.

Both man and woman are equal in importance. Reason and feeling are

present in both men and women. But in man reason predominates, and in

woman feeling predominates. It is easier to influence a man by appealing to

his reason than to his feeling; a woman responds more readily to an appeal

to her emotions.

By God-communion you bring about the harmony or balance of these two

qualities within yourself. I never acknowledge myself to be either man or

woman. I feel for others with the love of a mother, but no one can dissuade

me by an appeal to my emotions if my reason, or fatherly nature, does not

concur. To achieve a divine balance of reason and feeling should be the

purpose of both man and woman. Man usually has to cultivate more feeling,

and woman has to cultivate more logic.

We Must Perfect Love in at Least One Relationship

There is a deep reason why God does not usually allow us to recall our

previous lives. It is because we would be very clannish with those we knew

before, instead of expanding our love to encompass others. God wants us to

give friendship and love to all, but we must perfect it in at least one

relationship. When you meet old friends again, you can perfect your love in

relationships with them. A disciple means one in whom the guru perfects

the state of divine friendship. Those who follow the guru’s wishes are his

disciples. The wishes of a true guru are guided by divine wisdom, and if

you tune in with his wishes you will become free, as he himself is free.5

Above all, you should learn the most you can from this life, and strive to

pass to the highest grade of spiritual development in the school of life.

Commune with God. When you can do that, the deficiencies of all lesser

grades of living are forgiven. To free yourself from karma that binds you to

the lesser duties of life, develop wisdom and God-consciousness.

1 “The God-united yogi, abandoning attachment to fruits of actions, attains

the peace unshakable (peace born of self-discipline). The man who is not

united to God is ruled by desires; through such attachment he remains in

bondage” (Bhagavad Gita V:12).

2 See caste in glossary.

3 The school in Ranchi, Jharkhand, India, was founded in 1918 on the

estate property of the generous-hearted Maharaja of Kasimbazar. The India

headquarters of Self-Realization Fellowship—Yogoda Satsanga Society of

India—was founded at Dakshineswar, Calcutta, in 1939. The Hermitage

overlooking the Pacific Ocean in Encinitas, California, was a gift to

Paramahansa Yogananda from Rajarsi Janakananda (James J. Lynn) in

1936. Rajarsi Janakananda, a spiritually exalted disciple of Paramahansa

Yogananda, succeeded Paramahansaji as president of Self-Realization

Fellowship (Yogoda Satsanga Society of India) in 1952. (Publisher’s Note)

4 Those who received spiritual initiation from Paramahansa Yogananda in

past incarnations. (Publisher’s Note)

5 “If ye continue in my words, then are ye my disciples indeed, and ye shall

know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:31–32). “Men,

devotion-filled, who ceaselessly practice My precepts, without fault-

finding, they too become free from all karma” (Bhagavad Gita III:31).

Will Jesus Reincarnate Again?

First Self-Realization Fellowship Temple at Encinitas, California,

November 26, 1939

Many persons predict a second coming of Christ. Others think that the real

Christ has yet to come a first time. But Jesus did come on earth, and he

went away. These are facts. Had his life been only a myth, as some say, his

influence would not have survived for so many centuries. Even though he

was crucified, his mission was taken up by people all over the world,

because he lived for God.

“Behold, he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him.”1 Because of

this passage in the Bible, many sincere persons believe that Christ is

literally going to descend out of the clouds to us. The real explanation is

metaphysical. When you close your eyes you behold darkness, but behind

that darkness is the inner light. The contrast epitomizes the difference

between this world and the kingdom of God.

When I close my eyes and concentrate my will, I see Christ in that light;2

and every true devotee who is able to penetrate the spiritual eye shall see

him. In that inner light I behold Jesus just as clearly as I see another person

in this world. Everything perceived in that light is much finer. Wonderful

visions of saints come—if you are in earnest, and if you have developed

spiritually. Such experiences are not given to those who meditate just for a

few minutes and then concentrate on something else. When you really

“mean business” with God, and above all, love Him; when you willingly

lose sleep in order to persist in your search for Him, then you begin to see

divine visions. They are not hallucinations. True visions are emanations of

reality.

Divine Justice and the Law of Reincarnation

You may or may not believe in the law of reincarnation; but if this life is the

beginning and the end of human existence, it is impossible to reconcile the

inequalities of life with a divine justice. Why is one man born in a rich

family, whereas another child arrives in a poverty-stricken home, only to

die of starvation? Why is one person healthy enough to live 100 years, and

someone else sick all the time? Why are Eskimos born in the cold north and

other peoples in moderate climates, where the struggle to survive is easier?

Why are some babies born blind, or dead? Why? Why? Why? If you were

God, would you do such unjust things? What is the use of reading and

living according to the scriptures, if life is predestined by a whimsical God

who deliberately creates beings with bodies or brains that are imperfect?

According to the law of cause and effect, every action creates a

commensurate reaction. Therefore whatever is happening to us now must be

a result of something we have done previously. If there is nothing in this life

to account for present circumstances, the inescapable conclusion is that the

cause was set in motion at some prior time; that is, in some past human

existence. Your strongest moods and character tendencies did not begin

with this birth; they were established in your consciousness long before.

Thus we may understand how some persons show from early childhood

certain definite talents, or weaknesses, and so on.

We may understand, too, how the perfect life of Jesus on earth was the

result of several previous incarnations in which he had developed self-

mastery. His miraculous life as Christ was the result of many past lives of

spiritual schooling. He became an avatar,3 a divine incarnation, because in

previous lives as an ordinary human being he fought the temptations of the

flesh and conquered. His example gives the rest of mankind definite hope.

Otherwise, what chance have we? If God had sent angels to teach us I

would say, “Lord, why didn’t You create me as an angel? How can I

emulate beings who were created perfect and who have had no experience

with the tests and temptations that You have given me?”

We need for our ideal a being who is essentially like us. Jesus had

temptations to face. “Get thee behind me, Satan,” he said. And he

conquered. Had he never known temptation, his saying, “Get thee behind

me, Satan,” would have been playacting, and how could that inspire us?

Although he had already conquered the flesh in other lives, he had to feel its

weaknesses again in his incarnation as Jesus, to show humanity by his

mastery how high he had grown spiritually, and to give heart to all men by

his example.

Jesus Was Eliseus in His Former Life

Jesus attained most of his perfection in his former incarnation as Eliseus

(Elisha). I know for certain that he was Eliseus in a past life, and that Jesus’

guru, John the Baptist, was Elijah (Elias), in his former life.4 Eliseus’ later

incarnation as Jesus was foretold several hundred years before the event,

because he was destined to fulfill a divine plan of God's. That prophecy is

told in the Book of Isaiah (7:14), eight centuries before Christ: “Therefore

the Lord himself shall give you a sign: Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and

bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.” St. Matthew, recording the

event of Christ’s birth, stated: “Now all this was done, that it might be

fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, Behold, a

virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his

name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.”5

Jesus had learned all of life’s lessons in this school of many incarnations,

and had demonstrated his complete victory over material consciousness.

That is why the Heavenly Father said of him, “This is my beloved Son, in

whom I am well pleased.”6

Jesus was sent on earth as an example, that God’s other children might

know one who had overcome the delusions of this world. Great as he was,

Jesus nonetheless said humbly: “I do nothing of myself; but as my Father

hath taught me.”7 His entire love was for God. His whole consciousness

was absorbed in the Father.

We are all children of God. Many incarnations ago He created us as He

created Jesus. In the Gospel of St. John we find Jesus himself declaring: “Is

it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?”8 Jesus was made in the

image of God, as are we; and he conquered delusion, showing us how to do

likewise. If you conquer delusion in this life you will go back to God and

reincarnate no more. “Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the

temple of my God, and he shall go no more out.”9

But will Jesus come again? Metaphysically, he is already omnipresent. He

smiles at you through every flower. He feels his cosmic body in every speck

of space. Every movement of the wind breathes the breath of Jesus.

Through his oneness with the divine Christ Consciousness he is incarnate in

all that lives. If you have eyes to behold, you can see him enthroned

throughout creation.

One who is liberated, as Jesus is, becomes one with Spirit. Yet he retains his

individuality; for once God has created a human being, He keeps in His

cosmic consciousness a permanent record of that creation. Every thought

and action of every creature is recorded in the consciousness of God. Jesus

referred to this when he said, “Are not five sparrows sold for two farthings,

and not one of them is forgotten before God?”10

Christ Comes in Vision and in the Flesh to His Devotees

Jesus as an individual personality can reincarnate in two ways: in vision and

in the flesh. If you have great devotion you can see him inwardly exactly as

he appeared when he lived on earth. A number of saints have thus beheld

him and have relived with him various events of his life.

Jesus can reincarnate again at any time, in the physical body or in the inner

light, according to your devotion and power of concentration. Reincarnation

is forced upon most of humanity, but because Jesus has freed himself he can

come or not, as he wishes. He can appear to you in flesh and blood right

now if you have that complete devotion which is necessary to attract him;

but he will not come so long as your devotion is even one percent less than

that.

Years ago, when I was living and teaching in Boston, I once became so

busy that I forgot God for three days. The thought of continuing like that

was intolerable; I was preparing to pack up everything and leave America.

But just then a student of this path came by and asked to meditate with me.

As we sat there in meditation I began to pray: “Lord, I love Your work here

in America, but I love You more than the work, and if I am going to forget

You in this country I will leave.” Inwardly I heard the voice of God: “What

do you want?”

Impulsively I said, “I would like to see Krishna and Christ with all their

disciples.” Instantly I beheld them, on a sea of gold, just as clearly as I am

seeing you; and I worshiped them.

But in a little while my mind began to doubt. “This is not real,” I thought.

So I prayed again: “Lord, if the vision is true, let the other devotee in this

room also see it.” My friend suddenly cried out, “Oh! Krishna and Christ,

on a sea of gold!”

Then a new doubt arose: was it only thought transference? But even as this

idea crossed my mind, the voice of God said: “When I leave, the room will

become filled with the fragrance of the lotus, and whoever comes shall

notice it.” Each person who later visited me in that room unfailingly asked,

“What is this strange fragrance of flowers that I smell?”

For most of his followers Christ exists as an ideal personage they have read

about in the Bible. But to me he is much more than that. He is real. Once,

eight years ago, he came alone and meditated with me all night long.

During that time I saw a vision of the Hermitage.11 Many other times I

have seen him in visions, and talked with him. And that same Christ you

too can see.

You must be prepared to give up everything for communion with God. He

will test you. When you pray and pray and meditate and still you don’t see

Him, but say, “Lord, it doesn’t matter, You know that I am praying and I am

not going to stop until You come”—then He will respond. One saint said, “I

don’t care when He comes—I know He will come.” That is the attitude one

must have.

When you make up your mind to work to attain the Christ consciousness

that Jesus had, God will help you to fulfill that desire. But first you must

attain self-mastery, even as Jesus did. God does not bestow great spiritual

powers on devotees until they show Him they have conquered their human

weaknesses. Otherwise they might hurt other persons, even destroy whole

nations, by misuse of the divine might.

Jesus had sovereign power; he could easily have saved himself from

crucifixion, but during the agony in the Garden he only said, “Father, not

my will, but thine, be done,”12 and on the Cross, “Father, forgive them; for

they know not what they do.”13 In those final tests he showed he had

wholly conquered all ego-impulses. When you have unlimited power, as

Jesus did, and when everyone spurns you and still you do not retaliate, you

are a conqueror indeed.

All Great Avatars Will Come Again

Every saint who has come on earth has contributed toward the fulfillment of

God’s desire for the spiritual upliftment of all His human children. The

great ones come with two purposes: to inspire and enlighten a certain

number or a large mass of people; and to train real disciples, those who

pattern their lives after the master’s. The latter are the members of the

saint’s true “family,” constituting an inner group in whom he plants his

spiritual life. Jesus had twelve such disciples—and others too—but one of

the twelve betrayed his love and trust. The most difficult task for every

God-ordained spiritual teacher is to produce others like himself, but Jesus

made genuinely Christlike disciples.

Every spiritually enlightened teacher tries to enable many devotees to

commune with God. Yet each great master nevertheless leaves some

“unfinished symphony.” Because it remains unfinished, that teacher has to

come back again; but the time depends on God’s will. What I am telling you

is not in any book, nor is it anyone else’s idea; but it is true.

Jesus often healed others, but they didn’t always appreciate it. And he tired

of healing their physical ills; he wanted men to know God. He sought only

their highest good, but they crucified him; and so not all of his desire for

their spiritual development was fulfilled. That is why he has to come back

again. Great ones such as he return to earth to take more souls to God. Even

though they have attained their own perfection, their desire for others’

happiness and perfection has not been fulfilled. They want to bring their

lost brothers back to God.

When you pray to Jesus he feels your prayer. Free souls such as Jesus are

aware of the calls of their devotees. You may not know they are receiving

the vibrations of your feelings, but they are. And when your demand is very

strong, the great ones come to you.

Their desire is to redeem the whole earth, because every saint of God-

realization knows there is no death for him. He is living in that Eternal Joy.

Yet such saints are aware of the world’s grief. They say to the Heavenly

Father, “People are killing one another and suffering in many other ways.

Why must this be?” And God says: “I will send you back sometime to help

them.”

The God-ordained saviors of mankind have to return to earth again, but

when they will come, no one can say. Thus many people believe in Christ’s

second coming; but when it may happen depends on the will of God. The

great ones come only with the permission of the Heavenly Father. In some

cases, when the time is set, the prophets speak of it; but other avatars come

unannounced. Just the same, they come. I too wish to come, again and

again.

I want to ply my boat, many times,

Across the gulf-after-death,

And return to earth’s shores from my home in Heaven.

I want to load my boat

With those waiting, thirsty ones who are left behind,

And carry them by the opal pool of iridescent joy

Where my Father distributes

His all-desire-quenching liquid peace.14

It will be a wonderful thing to come to help all, and that is the way

everyone should want to live on this earth. Why seek selfish gain? If we are

known to God, we become known to His children, for in God we are all

one. It is so important that we find Him! For our own sake we must know

His love and be immersed in Him—night and day one continuous joy,

unending happiness.

Great souls will reincarnate again. God gave them individuality and a
divine role to play for Him. They have to do their work because they love
God. They will come, because there are hosts of brothers in this world who
are stumbling in the mud of delusion and suffering. The great ones have to
come again, as Jesus too will come again, to take more souls to the
kingdom of Heaven.
1 Revelation 1:7.
2 The light of the spiritual eye between the eyebrows. “The light of the
body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full
of light” (Matthew 6:22).
3 See avatar in glossary.
4 Referring to John the Baptist, Jesus said, “And if ye will receive it, this is
Elias, which was for to come” (Matthew 11:14).
5 Matt. 1:22–23.
6 Matt. 3:17.
7 John 8:28.
8 John 10:34.
9 Rev. 3:12.
10 Luke 12:6.
11 This talk was given in 1939; the Hermitage in Encinitas was built in
1936. Here Paramahansaji tells us that he saw the Hermitage in a vision in
1931. (Publisher’s Note)
12 Luke 22:42.
13 Luke 23:34.

14 From Paramahansa Yogananda’s poem, God’s Boatman.

The Dream Nature of the World

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, December 23, 1937

It is only when we wake from dreams that we know we have been

dreaming. Similarly, this life may be realized as a dream only when we

awake in Cosmic Consciousness.

During waking consciousness, the thought of a beautiful landscape does not

carry with it an immediate power of materialization. But in sleep we have a

heightened creative power of visualization and manifestation; our thoughts

swiftly erect the various structures of a dream. The projection of dream

images requires both thought and energy, just as the projection of moving

pictures requires both film and the electrical energy of light.

In sleep, life energy is released from various bodily demands and retires to

the brain cells, in which are stored the thought films of all past experiences.

The enlivening action of the energy on the stored-up thought films in the

subconscious mind results in the projection of the mental motion pictures

we call dreams. Dreams are actually lessons in the working of Cosmic

Consciousness. They come to man for a reason; their purpose is to awaken

in him a realization of the dream nature of the universe and of the method

of its operation.

The sages of India since ancient times have spoken of the universe as a

materialization of the thought of God. It is easy to say, of course, that this

universe is a dream. But the verisimilitude of “life” in our everyday

experiences makes it nearly impossible for us to believe that the world is

nothing more than a cosmic dream. It is necessary that we first develop

mind power in order to be able to realize that the universe is actually made

out of the thought of God and that, like a dream, it is structurally

evanescent.

We know that thoughts are invisible. But in dreamland they may be made

visible by the force of energy. So originally this whole universe—in the

form of God’s thoughts—was invisible, hidden within the cosmic stream of

consciousness. Only when those thoughts were crystallized by God’s

cosmic intelligent vibration, or energy, did they become visible to us as the

material universe.

So, although it is difficult to realize that this cosmic dream universe is

merely a dream, we should endeavor to think along this line. Many practical

benefits will come to us from such a true understanding of the physical

world.

To illustrate, let us say that a sleeping man dreams he is a great and

powerful warrior; that he goes to war, is shot, and lies dying. Just as he is

feeling very sad, he suddenly wakes up. He laughs at his dream fears as he

realizes he is not really a warrior, nor is he dying.

In “real” life one may have the same kind of experience. A soldier who

goes to war and is mortally wounded suddenly wakes up in the astral world

and realizes that the war experience was all a bad dream—that he has

neither broken bones nor a physical body. Nevertheless, he is still conscious

of life and of his individuality.

In order to realize that all the happenings of this world are dream

experiences, we should learn how to visualize our thoughts—how to

recharge them with the energy of concentration until they become visible

manifestations. Proper visualization by the exercise of concentration and

will power enables us to materialize thoughts, not only as dreams or visions

in the mental realm, but also as experiences in the material realm.

Matter Originates in Thought

Starting with the power of his creative imagination, man has built

wonderful scientific devices and a marvelous material civilization.

Inventions are the result of the materialization of human thought. Many

people try to achieve something in the realm of thought, but they give up

when difficulties arise. Only those persons who have visualized their

thoughts very strongly have been able to manifest them in outward form.

Everything on earth had its birth in the factory of the mind—either in God’s

mind or in man’s mind. Actually, man cannot think an “original” thought.

He can only borrow God’s thoughts and become an instrument to

materialize them.

Experiment with your thoughts. Try out your strongest thoughts on your

body. See if you cannot overcome undesirable habits and persistent

ailments. When you are successful you may apply your thought to make

changes in the world around you.

The relationship between thought and matter is very subtle. Suppose you

see a wooden pillar, and try, by the power of thought, to remove the pillar.

You cannot do that. In spite of what you think, the pillar is still there. It is a

materialization of someone’s previous thought. It will not go away merely

by your thinking it is not there. Only when you realize it as a

materialization of thought may you dematerialize it to your consciousness.

As you learn by experimenting with overcoming habits, pain, and so on,

you will begin to understand that the entire design of the body and all its

processes are controlled by thought.

One may gather great wisdom by cultivating the consciousness that this

world and everything in it is only a dream. First of all, do not take your

earth experiences too seriously. The root cause of sorrow is in viewing the

passing show with emotional involvement. If you continually think to

yourself, “I haven’t lived as I ought to have lived,” you only make yourself

miserable. Rather, do your best to be better; and no matter what difficulties

come, ever affirm, “It is all a dream. It will soon pass.” Then no trouble can

be a great trial to you. No happenings of this earth can in any way torture

you.

The consciousness of pain also has to be overcome if you are to know that

the world is only a dream. When I was a child I was hurt frequently when

playing football, and whenever I dreamed of playing football I always

dreamed that I was hurt. That fear-thought of being hurt had become rooted

in my subconscious mind, so that I suffered dream injuries even in sleep!

So one should not take his troubles too seriously, lest they darken the

subconscious mind. Difficulties come to us in order to awaken us to the

realization that this life is a dream. This lesson we all have to learn. Then

we can understand why there is so much difference in everything in the

world: some people are poor, some are rich; some are healthy and some are

sick. Although it may seem to be a terrible and cruel game, the justification

of the complications of life is that all of it is only a dream. Take it as such.

Think of the many aspirations and hopes you entertained as a child and as a

youth. They have gradually left you, but do not be discouraged; always

believe that, whatever is coming, it will simply be another scene in the

dream movie of God that is being shown in the playhouse of our minds. We

have to behold dream tragedies and dream comedies that we may be

variously entertained. If you can go to a movie and see a picture of war and

suffering, and afterward say, “What a wonderful picture!” so may you take

this life as a cosmic picture-show. Be prepared for every kind of experience

that may come to you, realizing that all are but dreams.

Each human life constitutes a drama; and the events of each day represent a

drama. You are living a fresh one each of the year’s 365 days. The thought

that you are merely a player in these dramas is very comforting. Realize

that the acting out of whatever part you are called upon to play does not

affect your real being. At the end of every earthly incarnation you are the

same—the immortal soul—untouched by sickness, sorrow, or death. “He

who cannot be ruffled by these (contacts of the senses with their objects),

who is calm and evenminded during pain and pleasure, he alone is fit to

attain everlastingness!”1

Pride Is the Greatest Barrier to Wisdom

The experiences of my life have intensified my conviction that human pride

is the greatest barrier to wisdom. Egotistical pride must go. It is a blind that

prevents our seeing God as the sole Doer, the Director of the Cosmic

Drama. You are playing different parts in this cosmic movie-house, and you

may not foresee what part will be assigned to you tomorrow. You should be

prepared for anything. Such is the law of life. Why sorrow, then, over life’s

experiences? If you take every happening as you would if you were seeing

someone else playing it in a motion picture, you will not grieve. Play your

365 roles each year with an inward smile and with the remembrance that

you are only dreaming. Then you will never again be hurt by life.

You have played many roles through many incarnations. But they were all

given to entertain you—not to frighten you. Your immortal soul cannot be

touched. In the motion picture of life you may cry, you may laugh, you may

play many parts; but inwardly you should ever say, “I am Spirit.” Great

consolation comes from realization of that wisdom.

You cannot expect to wake up from the delusion that earth life is real

merely by running away into the forest. You have to play out to the end the

part that is given you. Each human being is contributing to the enactment of

the motion picture of the cosmos. If you want to be happy you should play

out your part with dignity, assurance, and happiness. When you are awake

in God He will show you that you are unchanged, even though you have

played countless parts in His earth drama.

Dissociate Yourself From Your Experiences

Think of it! Of the fifteen hundred million people who have died every

hundred years, each one has played a definite part in this cosmic motion

picture. In fact, each human being has played in addition a separate “home

movie,” his own private motion picture. If you were to multiply all the

motion-picture lives portrayed by those millions of beings, you wouldn’t be

able to count them. But this show has a purpose: that you learn how to play

the various parts of the life movie without identifying your Self with your

role. It is important to avoid identification with pain or anger or any kind of

mental or physical suffering that comes. The best way to dissociate yourself

from your difficulty is to be mentally detached, as if you were merely a

spectator, while at the same time seeking a remedy.

Don’t expect to attain unalloyed peace and happiness from earthly life. This

should be your new attitude: no matter what your experiences are, enjoy

them in an objective way, as you would a movie. You have to find true

peace and happiness within yourself. Your outer experiences should be only

fun. You can convert all of them into miserable ones if you allow your mind

to do so. You may have good health and not appreciate it at all. But if you

become unwell, then you will appreciate what it is to have health. Show

gratitude to God for what He bestows on you, without waiting for reverses

to make you grateful.

You are a child immortal. You have come on earth to entertain and to be

entertained. This is why life should be a combination of both meditation

and activity. If you lose your inner balance, that is just the time when you

are vulnerable to worldly suffering. Don’t disgrace the name of God, the

One in whose image you are made. Awaken the innate fortitude of the mind

by affirming, “No matter what experiences come, they cannot touch me. I

am always happy.”

When I look back and compare, I find that life was much simpler at the

time we started our first hermitage (in a little mud hut in India that we had

rented for one rupee) than it is now, when we have the responsibility of

maintaining this large institution. Yet I preserve my mental balance no

matter what trials come. Learn to laugh at difficulties by remembering that

you are immortal: “Killed many times, I yet live; born many times, I am yet

changeless.” Whether you are suffering in this life, or smiling with

opulence and power, your consciousness should remain unchanged. If you

can accomplish evenmindedness, nothing can ever hurt you. The lives of all

great masters show that they have achieved this blessed state.

In order to be able to say with realization that all things are in the mind, you

must first develop an inner consciousness of divine peace that remains

unruffled by the experiences of this earth. Accept them as you would

dreams; and the time will come when you will find that, just by the power

of your strong thought, whatever you think will materialize. This is very

difficult to do, but it can be done.

A scientist must busy himself with going through several experiments in

order to arrive at one fact. But the spiritually developed man is able to

perceive the fact without going through a physical process. If you first

become one with God, then whatever you think can be materialized. This

truth was demonstrated many times by Jesus. He had realized his unity with

God.

Concentrate First on God

One’s first concentration should be on union with God. Every day as you go

through various earthly situations, mentally practice your oneness with

God. If a pain comes along to disturb that consciousness you should reason,

“Well, if I were asleep I wouldn’t feel this pain; why should I be aware of it

now? All experiences are fleeting dreams.” Practice overcoming all trials in

this manner.

The first state of concentration is to be able to see in your mind’s eye

anything that you wish. For example, I can keep looking at this room and

concentrating upon it until, when I close my eyes, I can still see the room

exactly as it is. This is the first step in deep concentration, but most people

haven’t the patience to practice it. I had the patience.

As you continue to practice visualization you will find that your thoughts

become materialized. The cosmic law will so arrange it that whatsoever you

are thinking of will be produced in actuality, if you command it to be so.

Suppose I am thinking of an apple, and the apple appears in my hand. That

would be a demonstration of the highest power of concentration. The great

ones can materialize anything right before your eyes, as did Babaji when he

materialized a palace at the time of Lahiri Mahasaya’s initiation in the

Himalayas.2 That was an expression of the power of concentration in its

highest form. Nothing worthwhile may be gained without effort and without

concentration.

Don’t be sensitive about the body and material concerns, nor let anyone

hurt you. Keep your consciousness aloof. Give good-will to all, but develop

a state of consciousness wherein nobody can ruffle you. Try to make others

happy every day. Share your wisdom with others. Do not permit yourself to

lose interest in life. Learn everything about one thing, and something about

everything. Realize that the more you seek, the more you will find; the

realms of thought are infinite. The moment you think you have attained

everything, you have circumscribed yourself. Search on and on,

continuously, and in the valley of your humbleness will gather the ocean of

God’s wisdom.

The greatest thing you can do to cultivate true wisdom is to practice the

consciousness of the world as a dream. If failure comes, say, “It is a dream.”

Then shut off the thought of failure from your mind. In the midst of

negative conditions, practice “opposition” by thinking and acting in a

positive, constructive way. Practice titiksha, which means not to give in to

unpleasant experiences, but to resist them without becoming upset mentally.

When sickness comes, follow hygienic laws of living, without permitting

your mind to be disturbed. Be unruffled in everything you do. If you try

hard to cultivate the dream-opposite of whatever trials you may be going

through, you will be able to change a nightmarish situation into a beautiful

experience. That freedom of mind will come when you realize that solids,

liquids, and all other forms of matter are expressions of God’s thought.

The best way to find true freedom is to meditate deeply. You can learn how

to meditate by studying the truths in the Self-Realization Fellowship

Lessons. No one else can convey to you the taste of sugar; you have to taste

it yourself.

Yesterday I was sitting in my room, looking back over my life, and I

realized that everything in the outer world that had promised great

happiness had deceived me; but one thing has never deceived me—my

inner peace. Indescribable billows of happiness surge over my soul. As I

passed through various experiences over the years, that unchanging inner

peace has been proof to me of the existence of God.

I was just thinking this when suddenly I saw a great Light. Everything else

vanished. There was feeling—that was all. My hand was not a hand, but a

feeling. When I touched my hands together there was no flesh there, only

feeling. Then I understood that I had become thoughts; everything around

me, the light and the room and the weight of the body—all were nothing but

thoughts.

It was a delightful experience. Gone were the sorrow and sadness I had felt

for things past, and in their place a great sense of freedom.

That consciousness of God-peace is never-ending. It is the only real state of

happiness. Everything else will fail you. Nothing else can make you happy

because only the joy of His presence is real.

It is not necessary to go through every kind of human experience in order to

attain this ultimate wisdom. You should be able to learn by studying the

lives of others. Why become helplessly involved in an endless panorama of

events in order to discover that nothing in this world can ever make you

happy?

One may learn the truth in two ways: by undergoing many good and bad

experiences, or by cultivating wisdom. Choose which you prefer. Krishna

said: “The attainment of wisdom immediately bestows supreme peace.”3

Jesus said: “Seek ye first the kingdom of God.”4 If you are seeking

something else first, you will surely be disillusioned. Each man rationalizes,

“Well, others have been deceived, but I won’t be.” Nevertheless, he will be

deceived. The only experience that is real, the only experience that brings

happiness, is awareness of the presence of God.

1 Bhagavad Gita II:15.

2 See Autobiography of a Yogi, chapter 34. Nikola Tesla, renowned

electrical scientist and inventor, understood the possibility of direct

materialization. He wrote:

“Long ago he (man) recognized that all perceptible matter comes from a

primary substance, or a tenuity beyond conception, filling all space, the

Akasa or luminiferous ether, which is acted upon by the life-giving Prana,

or creative force, calling into existence, in never-ending cycles, all things

and phenomena.

“Can man control this grandest, most awe-inspiring of all processes in

nature? Can he harness her inexhaustible energies to perform all their

functions at his bidding, more still cause them to operate simply by the

force of his will?

“If he could do this, he would have powers almost unlimited and

supernatural. At his command, with but a slight effort on his part, old

worlds would disappear and new ones of his planning would spring into

being. He could fix, solidify, and preserve the ethereal shapes of his

imagining, the fleeting visions of his dreams. He could express all the

creations of his mind on any scale, in forms concrete and imperishable.

“To create and to annihilate material substance, cause it to aggregate in

forms according to his desire, would be the supreme manifestation of the

power of Man’s mind, his most complete triumph over the physical world,

his crowning achievement, which would place him beside his Creator, make

the book, Prodigal Genius, published by Ives Washburn Inc. Reprinted with

permission of the David McKay Company Inc., New York.

3 Bhagavad Gita IV:39.

4 Matthew 6:33.

Paramahansa Yogananda in New York City, 1926

God’s Nature in the Mother and the Father

PART ONE: THE MOTHER

First Self-Realization Fellowship Temple at Encinitas, California, Mother’s

Day, May 11, 1941

Today let us hold a grateful thought for all good mothers who have nurtured

their children with affection. If children would reflect on the love shown

them by the mother, they would feel a desire to give similar affection to all

the children of the world. May all sons and daughters who have been

nurtured by a mother’s love be themselves filled with a mother’s affection,

which is unconditional love, and express it toward others. Thus shall they

solace the world with peace and bring heaven on earth.

The mother’s love is not given to us to spoil us with indulgence, but to

soften our hearts, that we may in turn soften others with kindness, and free

struggling souls from the hard knots of bondage to the world. Those who

are helplessly shackled by sin and dire difficulties need our tenderness and

love.

My sincere and complete devotion to my earthly mother was the first cause

of my love for the Divine Mother. Thus it was my great love for my mother

that led to my illumination.

In India we like to speak of God as Mother Divine, because a true mother is

more tender and forgiving than a father. The mother is an expression of the

unconditional love of God. Mothers were created by God to show us that

He loves us with or without cause. Every woman is to me a representative

of the Mother. I see the Cosmic Mother in all. That which I find most

admirable in woman is her mother love. Those who think of woman as an

object of lust perish in that fire; but those who look upon all women as

incarnations of the Mother Divine find in them a sacredness that is

inviolable. When you can see every woman as your mother, as some of our

God-realized masters in India did, universal love comes into your heart.

Certain skeptical followers of a great saint wanted to test him, and sent to

him some beautiful prostitutes. He quickly jumped up and cried: “Mother

Divine, in these forms You have come to me. I bow to you all.” The women

knelt before him and were ashamed. From that moment they were

spiritually changed.

Every man who looks upon woman as an incarnation of the Immortal

Mother will find salvation. A husband should see in his wife the pure

beauty of the Mother Divine. Looking upon the wife as the Mother, he will

find in her a holy essence not discerned before.

Mothers would not be able to love their children if God hadn’t implanted

that love in them. Yet credit belongs to the instrument also, because the

flood of divine love passes through the human mother. All the great masters

have shown honor to their mothers. Swami Shankara,1 after the death of his

mother, disregarded the monastic injunctions against performing ceremonial

family rites and cremated her body in a divine flame that he caused to

emanate from his hand.

A home is made gracious by the presence of the Divine Mother in the form

of the human mother. Isn’t that a thought to remember? Do not forget it.

Love for the Mother must be constantly cultivated in your heart, so that

whenever you see a woman, you behold her as your mother. If you look

upon woman without lust of the eyes, you will be able to draw from her

store of spiritual treasures.

Why was the mother given such love? That she might love her child

unconditionally. Loving one’s own child is only a practice of the love

divine. The mother thinks it is her own child, but it is the child of God. The

child will be taken away as soon as the Divine Spirit calls. So every mother

should extend that love she feels for her child unto all the children of the

earth.

A mother is expected to look after her son, and a son is told to honor his

mother; but I say that a son should not only love his mother but should look

on all women as expressions of the Divine Mother.

Each mother should remember that the divine unconditional love is passing

through her and she is blessed. She should realize that it is not her own love

she gives, but the love of the Mother Divine in her. She should be proud of

her children, but should not limit herself by bestowing love only on her own

sons and daughters. A mother should give divine unconditional love to all.

This is my message for you today.

Mothers, be proud that the Divine Mother took your form to give love

tangibly to the world, not only to your children but unto all children of the

earth. Then you will be really blessed; and instead of thinking that you have

one child, or five children, you will realize, “I have many children all over

the earth.” In that awareness you are one with the Divine Mother.

The mother who looks upon all God’s children as her own is no longer a

mortal mother. She becomes the Mother Immortal. This is what all women

saints are. One day they realize: “The great love that I feel for my child I

now feel for all. Now I know that I am not this body, but an expression of

the Cosmic Mother.” Think what you can do! From an ordinary woman to

Divine Mother! And why not? The Universal Mother made you in Her

image and you should manifest that image by bestowing on all beings Her

illimitable love.

PART TWO: THE FATHER

Self-Realization Fellowship Temple, Hollywood, California, Father’s Day,

June 18, 1944

On this Father’s Day we affirm our fealty to the Heavenly Father. While the

human father’s love is not always unconditional, still his love is guided by

wisdom, regard for law, and the will to protect others. The Divine Father of

wisdom, law, and protection, who is represented in all good human fathers,

we honor today.

A father should remember he is not just a human parent; he is a

representative of the Heavenly Father. To that Cosmic Father I pay tribute.

It is He who is behind all fathers. Each father should therefore realize that

he has a responsibility to behave properly, for the transparent light of Spirit

cannot flow through him if his mind is darkened with delusion and

erroneous thoughts. He must keep himself pure, for it is through him and

through all other fathers that the Heavenly Father looks after the children of

earth.

A human father’s body and mind ought to be a temple of the Divine Father.

As an instrument of the Divine Being, the father plays his greatest creative

role when he implants in his children thoughts that will lead to God-

realization.

To produce offspring is not a unique accomplishment; the animals do that.

But to produce children on the plane of divine love and in a spiritual

consciousness is an important achievement. Even animals may be bred to

order; yet many human children are born out of passion and accident,

emotion and evil. How can they be pure and perfect? The perpetrators of

thefts and other crimes are usually children who were born out of passion,

although sometimes there is a good soul here and there.

Example Is the Best Teacher

Character building should be taught in schools and colleges, but fathers

should realize that example is more important than schooling. One should

not tell his children, “Do not do as I do, but do as I say.” If you do not want

a child to smoke, you yourself should not smoke. If you want a child to be

mild and noble of speech, you should not talk to your wife impatiently,

because the child notices your example. Be kind in word and thought

because it is the Heavenly Father who has taken your form to look after the

child.

Let every father remember, when tempted to speak to a child with

dictatorial harshness, “Because my voice is meant to be used by the Cosmic

Father, I should never allow Satan, the father of ignorance, to speak through

me with mean, unreasoning sternness. I should always guide my children

with the loving persuasiveness of truth. My mind should be a transparent

glass through which shines the Heavenly Father’s light of wisdom.”

We should use the wisdom of the Father-God and the love of the Mother-

God to bring peace on earth. A good father could never bring himself to kill

his children; and if all fathers filled their hearts with the love of the Divine

Father, who cares for His children of all nations, how could there be any

war? Love is the spiritual weapon with which to end all war.

To the Lord I have dedicated my voice, my eyes, my hands, my feet, my

heart, my body, my feelings, my will—my being. I say to all fathers: “When

you destroy the ego, you will realize the protecting nature and wisdom of

the Heavenly Father working through you.”

1 Lord Shankara’s Prayer to the Divine Mother for Forgiveness of Sins

bears the refrain: “Though bad sons are many, never has there been a bad

mother.”

Looking at Creation With Seeing Eyes

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, August 17, 1939

Marvelous indeed is the Lord’s universe. Within it He is working all His

wonders of creation. Do not be a walking “dead man” in this world;

observe, analyze, and appreciate what God and His agent, man, have

wrought here. How intricate is the universal mechanism! Reflect on the way

we are made, and in what orderly fashion the whole machinery of creation

runs according to cosmic law.

We all see the flowers and enjoy their beauty, but who knows what is

causing the flowers? Anything one uses or sees every day—be it a

handkerchief, a musical instrument, a house, or a tree—he should question

and ponder by what means, of what substance, it is made. Cars are taken for

granted; but if you were to visit the factories in which they are produced,

you would realize how complicated automobiles are. Consider too what

went into making the paper for the daily news, and the intricate machinery

that imprints it—no human hand could operate so fast.

And if the creation of everyday man-made objects can be so complex, how

vastly more complicated the creation of plants, animals, and human beings!

It takes ten years’ study of medical science to understand the composition,

functions, and requirements of the seemingly simple human body. Even a

casual analysis reveals much to wonder at—though I sometimes think God

could have made a few improvements!

When a plant is growing in water in a glass jar, one can see that its roots are

like hairs. Through the God-given intelligent energy in the roots the plant

draws from soil and water the food it requires for growth. Like an upturned

plant, man similarly absorbs through his hair electric currents helpful to the

body.1

Is it not amazing that the sap which feeds the leaves of the plant flows

upward against the pull of gravity? When the skin of the plant is removed,

one can see the intricate network of tubes that channel this sap. That which

carries on this process of sustenance and growth is the mystery called life.

When I am in the ecstasy of God-consciousness, I behold this life in even a

blade of grass. Little did I dream that I would be able to see such hidden

marvels of creation! To concentrate on these marvels is to stand in awe of

what the Lord has done.

With calculated precision God has ordained the structural form of each

living thing, and the requirements for maintaining that form in good

working order. If there is any deficiency in those requirements—food, for

example—plants, animals, and human beings suffer. The average person

draws from his food all the various chemical elements his body needs; but

there are many dietary transgressors whose meals do not contain all the

required elements, or the correct balance of them. Improper nourishment is

one of the main causes of all sickness in man. The effects of dietary

deficiency can be seen almost immediately in a plant when some necessary

chemical is omitted from its food.

There are vital exchanges between man and all other living things. For eons

India has had the custom of cremation and scattering the ashes of the dead.

In this and other ways man feeds Mother Earth, and her plants in turn feed

man.

The reciprocity between man and trees is well known. Man inhales oxygen

and exhales carbon dioxide.2 Trees absorb and store carbon dioxide and

water, which they break down by photosynthesis to create carbohydrates

(food). In the process they give off oxygen, essential to man.3

Photosynthesis, being dependent on sunlight, stops at night. However,

through another process called respiration, trees continuously release

carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, particularly at night when the

counteracting influence of carbon-absorbing, oxygen-producing

photosynthesis is not present. As night air is usually still, the heavy carbon

dioxide gas settles near the ground. In part for this reason, the custom of

sleeping on beds—that is, above ground level—came about.

The Limitations of the Physical Senses

Science has taught us a great deal about the intricate mechanisms of our

universe and about the substances of which we are all made, but there is

still vast knowledge to be uncovered. We could perceive more and

appreciate more if we developed the underlying powers of our sensory

organs. Things we should see with our eyes we do not see, things we should

hear with our ears we do not hear, because our senses are too habituated,

too attached, to experiences of the limited gross physical world. Freedom

from that attachment is not negation of sensory enjoyment; it permits a

broadening of the God-given sensory powers to their fullest spiritual

potential.

On the material plane man has discovered various ways to increase his

seeing power. The unaided physical eye receives only limited impressions

of color. However, under ultraviolet light, drab-looking pieces of rock in

which certain minerals are present will show forth luminescent colors.

Remove the ultraviolet light and the rocks assume their original dull hue.

Many colors in the physical world, such as the blue of the sky, are really

optical illusions caused by the reflection of light on various kinds of

particles. Because your eyes register only a limited degree of the creative

vibration that makes up everything in creation, you do not see the subtle

astral4 colors, which are hidden in everything around you. Could you but

see, you would be amazed at their beauty. Even the most gorgeous shades

on earth appear ugly, gross, and wild in comparison to the magnificent hues

of the astral world.

So neither your eyes nor your ears register everything possible. You cannot

smell astral fragrances, nor perceive with your other physical sense organs

the myriad finer forms and impressions passing through the ether. Even if

St. Francis were here at this moment in his astral form, you would not be

able to see and hear and touch him. Yet it is possible to advance beyond

ordinary sensory limitations, for I have seen him.

Often man does not cognize even things that his senses are able to perceive.

Those persons who have perceptive eyes enjoy beauty everywhere. Others

act as if they had no eyes; even in a beautiful place they fail to “see”

anything. When I visited Mexico and saw the “Floating Gardens” of Lake

Xochimilco,5 their loveliness filled my heart with awareness of the Divine

Artist. Another man, standing nearby, seemed equally engrossed. However,

something told me he was not seeing what I was seeing, so I asked his

reaction to the picturesque scene. “I was thinking of how to drain off the

water and make more land,” he replied. An engineer, he was seeing the lake

in his own way. So we view things according to our different mentalities

and moods.

Every soul is encased in a composite vibration of sensations, thoughts,

feelings—all the factors that make up a person’s being, or consciousness.

Each one has a different composition, a different vibration. All the things

you have done since childhood are stored in tabloid form as tendencies in

your brain. They make you what you are. Because we do not see this

tabloid pattern, we wonder why people behave as they do. Some become

suddenly elated, or inexplicably angry or moody; even they don’t know

why. Some are always busy criticizing or gossiping about others, when

there is plenty of “house-cleaning” to do in their own “home”! The invisible

tabloid tendencies in the brain compel each one to behave in certain ways.

They bury the soul, preventing the expression of one’s true Self. How

complex is man! each one in himself a full-length novel.

The Infinite Potential of Thought

Man is supposed to get something out of this life besides eating, sleeping,

and working. The thinkers begin to wonder about life. They observe and

question why things happen, or do not happen, in a certain way. We have a

first and then a second set of teeth; why not a third? What causes this

regulation? Because of man’s unquestioning acceptance of many delusive

thoughts of physical limitation, he allows them to control his present sphere

of existence. Thinkers do not accept the inevitable; they turn their efforts

toward changing it. This is the ingredient that makes progress possible.

I am thrilled when I see the great manufacturing centers, the remarkable

inventions, and other exceptional human accomplishments. How much has

come from the brain of man! And the brain itself is infinitely more intricate

than anything it has produced.

There is a story about a certain king who showed such affectionate regard

for his prime minister that others in the court, noticing the monarch’s

obvious preference, were jealous. Realizing this, the king wanted to show

them why the minister was his favorite. Some music sounded in the

distance, and the king turned to one of his courtiers, saying, “Please find out

what is going on.” After some time the man returned with the information

that it was a marriage procession. “Who is going to be married?” inquired

the king. The courtier didn’t know, so another courtier was sent out. The

man returned with a reply to the king’s latest query, but when the sovereign

asked another question he could not answer. The result was the same with

courtier after courtier. Finally the king called for the prime minister and

asked him to go and find out what was taking place. When the minister

returned, the king plied him with questions, every one of which the alert

and thorough prime minister was able to answer satisfactorily.

A great many persons are dull-minded like the uninformed courtiers. They

are not necessarily stupid; just too mentally lazy to make any effort beyond

obvious necessity. I can condone physical laziness (there might be a

justifiable physiological cause); but there is no excuse for mental laziness!

The mentally idle do not like to think, because even that seems too much

work for them.

Thought is fascinating. No one will ever be able to tabulate all the

tendencies and perceptions of the mind; its capacity is infinite. Yet the mind

cannot think an original thought: there is not a single idea that God has not

originated already in conceiving His past, present, and future creations.

Therefore if you think deeply enough about a subject, the answer to any

question about it will come.

You must feel as well as think; if you do not have feeling along with your

thoughts, you will not always be successful in reaching the right conclusion.

Feeling is an expression of intuition, the repository of all knowledge.

Feeling and thought, or reason, must be balanced; only then does the divine

image of God within you, the soul, manifest its full nature. Hence Yoga

teaches one how to balance his powers of reason and feeling. One who does

not have both equally is not a fully developed person.

In God-Consciousness Everything Becomes Beautiful

In my younger days I used to go sight-seeing, but my interest was only in

temples. As my consciousness changed with the practice of meditation, I

began to look at the world differently; everything seemed transformed and

interesting to me. Now I see behind all creation the kingdom of my Father.

It is enchanting beyond any dreams of this world! And sometimes I see the

beauties of His kingdom showing through the gross physical creation.

As you progress spiritually and draw closer to God, He reveals to you more

and more wonders of creation. Even in the dead and ugly-looking stalks of

a wheat field after the harvest you will see life. It played its part there, and

to the ordinary eye it is gone; but with the divine eye6 you will see, even in

the outer desolation, the beautiful colors of dancing electrons and protons.

Behind every material object is an astral blueprint of colored light. In the

astral world everything is motion, everything is living; there is nothing

called “dead.” Even in the physical world death is not cessation of life, only

a change into a different form. Life is still throbbing in the “lifeless” object.

In the bones of dead animals I have beheld rich colors and vibrating light.

You see only the gross material products coming from God’s hidden factory

behind creation; but if you went into the factory itself, you would behold in

what marvelous manner everything in this world has been brought into

manifestation.

The factory behind creation is beyond imagination; the whole universe is a

single thought in the mind of God! So simple, yet the galaxies are guided by

mathematics inconceivable by man. Everything runs in perfect order. What

tremendous intelligence is manifested in creation! The Infinite is working in

everything. All the different eddies of motion called life are controlled by

that Cosmic Intelligence.

Every hundred years a billion and a half persons leave this earth, and more

than that many are born. What complexities of supply and demand are

created thereby! Even so, the Divine Intelligence has given ample food to

take care of human needs. Man alone is responsible for lack and misery on

earth. By this time we could have had a millennium—everyone healthy and

supplied with all of life’s necessities, living in a happy and peaceful way in

a wisely governed existence. But man’s selfishness, and power in the hands

of the inept, destroys such a possibility. Abraham Lincoln expressed the

highest ideal of government when he said it should be “of the people, by the

people, and for the people.” He was a deeply spiritual man. Even so, he had

to suffer because of the ignorance of a few.

This World Is a Temporal Place

It is natural to wonder where exceptional men such as Lincoln, and departed

dear ones, once so tangible! have gone after death. Such questions arise in

the mind, not to discourage you, but to awaken in you a realization of the

temporal dream-nature of life. The Bhagavad Gita7 tells us: “That which is

night (of slumber) to all creatures is (luminous) wakefulness to the man of

self-mastery....The seeming state of wakefulness of the ordinary man is

perceived by a sage to be, in reality, a state of delusive sleep.”

Thus most people are sleeping soundly throughout this dream-life; only the

man of realization is awake. He is not interested in the activities that

engross the ordinary man who busies himself seeking wealth and sense

pleasures, and wasting time in shallow social engagements. Man makes a

nervous wreck of himself pursuing the fleeting attractions of this world,

whereas the joy and wonder of God, which is beyond description, would

give him so much more: happiness and fulfillment unending!

Only a little while you live as an individualized image in God’s dream-

world. You are dreaming your mortal existence; it is part of God’s cosmic

dream. Every day you are living in this dream of physical being. Every

night, in deep sleep, it is gone. And one day, when you awaken in God—

who is your real Self—the dream will be gone forever.

Seek the Lord Who Is Hiding Behind Creation

Use your time rightly, to discover the factory of the Divine behind this

world. Once for an entire day I beheld in vision the infinite wonders of

creation, and I prayed:

“O Father, when I was blind I found not a door that led to Thee. Thou hast

healed my eyes; now I discover doors everywhere: the hearts of flowers, the

voices of friendship, memories of lovely experiences. Each gust of my

prayer opens a new entrance to the vast temple of Thy presence.”8

Be adamant, strong, and unflinching in your determination to discover the

One who is hiding behind this creation. Snatch yourself away from the

demands of the world, and do not go to bed at night until you have

consciously communed with God. I seldom retire before four o’clock in the

morning; only during the night can I find freedom from my responsibilities

and be wholly with God.

The ordinary man with his everyday responsibilities can be just as busy as

the president of the United States. Busy, busy, busy! that is life’s demand.

You have to reserve time each day to get away from the world and be with

God. Control your life, and set aside time to practice meditation for

communion with Him. Then everything in this world will be a wonder to

you.

As scientists made their discoveries by following certain disciplines and

physical laws, so will you find God without fail when you scientifically

follow spiritual laws. You are helping yourself in the highest way when you

study and apply these laws as set forth in the Self-Realization Fellowship

teachings.

Forget not the things I have told you. “A word to the wise—those who are

spiritually awakened—is sufficient.” Yet Jesus said: “The harvest truly is

plenteous, but the laborers are few.”9 If you receive these teachings and

practice them, you will realize every truth I have told you. It is not

complicated; I have given only those spiritual techniques that will enable

you to perceive and commune with God. No matter how unpleasant your

circumstances in this world, when you discover God you will see Him

working through you and manifesting in everything, and you will be filled

with His love and joy.

India’s rishis remind us that health and prosperity, material

accomplishments and possessions, are not lasting. Why concentrate only on

goals that are perishable? What is lasting is the ever-new joyous contact of

God and the attainment of Self-realization—finding out who you are,

knowing that the image of God is within you. When you have that

realization, you will be a satisfied person. The scriptures of India describe

one who attains this state as a siddha, “successful one.” When I was

teaching congregations of hundreds and thousands I was often called

“successful.” That did not impress me. One may be recognized by the

whole world and yet be unknown to the only One whose attention matters;

and he who attracts the notice of God may be entirely unknown to the

world. Which would you prefer? I wanted only the recognition of my

Father. The acclaim of the world can be so intoxicating that man forgets to

cultivate the all-fulfilling approbation of the Lord.

It is natural for man to yearn for the role of king on this earthly stage, but if

all were kings, there could be no play. Your part is just as important as

anyone else’s. The point is that you must play your role according to the

Divine Director’s wish; when you live your part to please God, you will be

successful. This should be the constant prayer in every human heart:

“My Lord, work Thou through my hands; they were made to serve Thee

and to pick flowers for Thy temple. Mine eyes were made to behold Thy

presence in the flickering stars, in the eyes of soulful devotees; my feet

were made to take me to Thy temples everywhere to sip the nectar of Thy

sermons to seeking souls; my voice was made only to speak of Thee. I taste

wholesome food that I may be reminded of Thine all-nourishing goodness; I

inhale the perfume of flowers that I may breathe Thy fragrant presence

there. I dedicate my thoughts, feelings, and love to Thee. All my senses are

in harmony with Thy celestial orchestra of fragrance, beauty, and joy

playing their refrain in the eternal symphony of the cosmos.

“Lead me from darkness to light. Lead me from hatred to love. Lead me

from limitations to Thine inexhaustible power; lead me from ignorance to

wisdom. Lead me from suffering and death to everlasting life and

enjoyment in Thee. Above all, lead me from the delusion of human

attachment into realization of Thy love eternal, which plays hide-and-seek

with me in all forms of human love.

“Father, Mother, Friend, Beloved God, reveal Thyself unto me! Leave me

in ignorance no longer. All delusion I cast from the sacred shrine of my

soul. Be Thou the only King sitting on the throne of my ambitions, the only

Queen in the castle of my love, the only Deity in the temple of my soul.

Keep me awake in Thy consciousness, that I may pray and demand
unceasingly until Thou dost open all doors into Thy home of wisdom, and
there receive me, Thy prodigal child, and entertain me with the fatted calf
of immortality and eternal joy.”
1 “The physical body, with roots of hair, cerebrospinal trunk, nerve
branches, and boughs of hands and feet, bears a resemblance to an inverted
tree....Some yogis do not cut their hair but keep it long, to draw from the
ether a greater quantity of cosmic rays. The reason for Samson’s having lost
his superhuman strength when his hair was shorn by Delilah may well be
that he had practiced certain yogic exercises that transform one’s hair into
sensitive antennae to draw cosmic energy from the ether.”—Paramahansa
Yogananda, Self-Realization magazine, May-June 1963.
2 An excess of carbon dioxide is poisonous to the body. However, a small
amount of carbon dioxide is retained in the blood, and is vital to life as a
regulator of the bodily chemistry. (Publisher’s Note)
3 “It is quite probable that our entire supply of free oxygen, one-fifth of the
atmosphere, has been furnished by photosynthesis.”—Encyclopaedia
Britannica
4 Within every physical being and object and vibration is its finer astral
counterpart, composed of luminous lifetronic energy.
5 The gardens are now fixed “islands,” the plant roots having long since
become anchored to the bottom of the lake, which is extremely shallow.
6 The spiritual or third eye in man; the eye of intuitive perception.
7 II:69.
8 “Doors Everywhere,” in Whispers from Eternity.
9 Matthew 9:37.

The Invisible Man

First Self-Realization Fellowship Temple at Encinitas, California, March 3,

1940

It seems preposterous to think of man as invisible. We are visible to

ourselves every day as a physical body. But there are many ways in which

we manifest our essential invisibility. For example, close your eyes. Your

form is invisible to you; how do you know you exist? You are aware of the

body’s weight; you can hear, smell, taste, and touch. Nevertheless you are

real to yourself only in terms of ideas. You are an invisible nucleus around

which many thoughts are revolving. Now open your eyes. Are you the form

that you see, or that inner being you were just now conscious of with eyes

closed?

The visible man is of little importance; the invisible self, or soul, is of

utmost importance. During sleep you are unaware of the visible man; but

you are aware of yourself, for when you wake up you know whether you

slept well or poorly. Therefore your invisible self is real. Take that away

and your outer visibility is meaningless. Without the invisible self the body

would be as worthless as a corpse. The invisible man within is the real one.

But strange to say, man doesn’t try to analyze what that invisible self is. He

is so interested in the form he can see, thinking constantly about his

physical appearance and well-being, he doesn’t stop to reason out that the

inner unseen self is the reality.

Within the physical body, yet invisible to physical eyes, is an identical body

of light, the astral encasement of the soul. If one of your fingers has been

cut off, you still feel as if that finger were there. Anyone who has lost a

limb knows this sensation. There is an invisible astral counterpart for all the

bodily parts. Behind your physical heart is an invisible heart. Without it,

your visible heart would not beat. You have invisible organs of sight and

hearing, an invisible brain, invisible bones and nerves. These parts—tissues

of light and energy—constitute the astral body of the invisible man. The

astral body looks exactly like the visible one, except that its form, being

made of light and energy, is exceedingly subtle.

If you are physically afflicted you should not say, “My sight is gone,” or “I

have lost a hand.” Your invisible eyes and hands are still present. Though

your physical arm may be paralyzed, your invisible arm is not disabled.

Never believe that the invisible organs are in any way affected by disease of

the physical organs, because your negative thought would impede the flow

of intelligent life energy into the physical body parts.

Electrical currents are passed through a wire. Which is more important, the

wire or the electricity? The wire exists merely for the passage of the

electricity; the electricity does not exist for the wire. So the body exists for

the use of the invisible man, the soul, not he for the body. However, the

physical body must be in a certain condition for the invisible self to remain

there.

What a pity that this invisible self is tied to the body! If it were not, we

could go walking on the water and fly in the sky and come back into the

physical body again. The astral body of the invisible self has sensory

perceptions much greater than those of its physical counterpart. Man has

invented machines that in some ways are better than the physical body,

which has many limitations. But when your consciousness of the invisible

astral body is developed, you will realize that it can hear what the physical

ears cannot hear, and see what the physical eyes cannot see. It can also

smell, taste, and touch objects far beyond the range of the physical senses.

And you can make it large or small at will, just as pictures on a movie

screen can be made large or small by the man in the projection booth.

Investigate the Electricity That Lights the Body Bulb

You are always looking after the physical body-bulb. Have you never

thought how wonderful it would be to investigate the electricity that lights

the bulb? Visible man is composed basically of sixteen elements, chemicals

that can be purchased in a store. Your body is worth only about ninety

cents; in depression times even less! Why not cultivate a better

acquaintance with the invisible man? It is he who has power and friends and

love. Without him, visible man has nothing but the chemicals of which he is

made.

Turn the spotlight of your attention inward, away from the limited visible

man. The physical body has backaches and stomachaches; it suffers

deterioration in old age; it is the nastiest little animal! always crying and

whining for something. The visible man cannot bear a bad fall, and he

sometimes shrinks at even a pinprick; the invisible man is unhurt by

anything. He is free. He can banish all the troubles of the physical body.

The invisible man within you is what you are. “The One who pervades all

things is imperishable. Nothing has power to destroy this Unchangeable

Spirit.”1

You think you are the body, but you are not. A piece of ice can be melted

into liquid and then made to disappear by evaporation. The process can be

reversed, condensing the vapor into liquid and freezing the liquid into solid

form as ice once again. The ordinary man has not yet learned to perform

similar transformations with his bodily atoms, but Christ showed that it

could be done.

Man’s Body Is Composed of 35 Thoughts of God

The human body of 16 material elements is nothing more than a shadow of

the invisible man, who has two bodies—an astral form made of electrical

currents, and a causal form made of ideas. Your astral form of light consists

of 19 elements and your invisible causal form is made of 35 thoughts—the

19 ideas that produced the 19 electrical elements of your astral body;2 and

the 16 ideas that produced the 16 gross material elements of your physical

body. God first created the iron and potassium and other chemical elements

in idea; then He materialized them to make your physical body. The real

you is invisible, because even your physical body, as well as everything else

in creation, was first conceived in thought.

So your body is essentially a causal form of 35 thoughts within an astral

body of 19 elements of light and energy, which in turn is encased in a

physical body of 16 chemical elements. When you die, the visible physical

body will vanish, but the astral body of the invisible self within will be real

to you; you will be aware of your astral form. By higher spiritual

advancement you will see that your subtle astral body can be reduced to 35

thoughts, and that your consciousness behind those 35 thoughts is the

Reality; for your consciousness, or soul, is a spark of the cosmic

consciousness of God.

When you are viewing a motion picture you see many figures on the screen,

but if you look up you see only one beam of light projecting those images.

Similarly, from the brain flow five currents of energy, the vibratory creative

elements of earth, water, fire, air, and ether, which condense to materialize

this physical body on the screen of creation.3

Motion pictures used to be silent; now there is sound, and they are

experimenting with odors, so that when you see a garden on the screen you

will also smell the fragrance of the flowers. When those light-produced

forms can be made true to touch and taste also, you will have produced the

fivefold aspects of God’s creation. The five senses by which man

apprehends creation have their correspondences in the five elemental

electricities—ether (sound), air (touch), fire (sight), water (taste), and earth

(smell)—from which creation was materialized. Someday the whole world

will appear to you as a kind of motion picture—forms of light that are true

to the five sensory perceptions. The terrible things that are happening in the

world now are distressingly real; but when you are able to behold them as

creations of light and shadow, you will understand that they are only a

show, a part of God’s play.

You are only dreaming that you have a body of flesh. Your real self is light

and consciousness. You are not the physical body. The visibility of the body

deludes our material consciousness. If you cultivate superconsciousness—

awareness of your real self, the soul—you will realize that the body is

simply a projection of that invisible self within. Then you can do anything

with the body. But don’t try just yet to walk on water!

In the motion-picture house you are engrossed in the images on the screen.

They look so real! You are not conscious of the light overhead by which the

images are being projected. But if you look up you can see that the visible

is proceeding out of the invisible; the forms on the screen are all proceeding

out of that one light from the projection booth. What is the difference

between the light and the pictures? If there were no light, could pictures

have been materialized? Similarly, if there were no invisible man, there

would be no visible man. When the invisible man leaves the physical form,

the body disintegrates. Those who understand the subtle relationship

between the visible and the invisible man can dematerialize and materialize

the physical body at will.4 We are coming to that evolutionary period

during which we will realize increasingly that we are really invisible

beings, or souls.

The Invisible Man Is Free From Suffering and Death

To live only in the consciousness of this visible body of flesh is spiritually

retarding, for the body is subject to the sufferings of disease, injury, poverty,

hunger, and death. We should not desire to think of ourselves as this visible,

vulnerable, destructible body. The invisible man within us cannot be hurt or

killed. Should we not strive more to realize our unknown immortal nature?

By increasing our knowledge of this invisible self we will be able to control

the man visible, as great masters do. Even when the visible man is in

distress, he who is aware of his divine powers as the invisible man within

can remain detached from physical suffering.

How will you gain such control? First you must learn to live more in

silence; you must learn to meditate. It may seem uninteresting at first; you

have kept so closely in touch with this visible body that you have difficulty

in thinking about anything except its ceaseless troubles, desires, and

demands. But make the effort. Keeping your eyes closed, repeat again and

again, “I am made in the image of God. My life cannot be destroyed by any

means. I am the invisible man everlasting.”

Everything Is the Result of an Idea

That invisible man is made in the image of God, free as the Spirit is free. In

the visible man lie all the troubles and limitations of the world. Whenever

we are conscious of our bodies we are tied to the body’s limitations. Hence

the great masters teach us to close our eyes and remind ourselves, by

meditation on the invisible self, that we are not restricted to what our

physical bodies can do. I used to affirm with deep conviction: “I am not

limited by my physical body. Wherever I want to go, I am instantly there.”

You may say, “That is only a thought.” Well, what is thought? Everything

you see is the result of an idea. You could not visualize anything without

thought. Invisible thought gives all things their reality. Therefore if you can

control your thought processes, you can make anything visible; you can

materialize it by the power of your concentration.

Suppose you are sitting in silence and I ask you to concentrate on this

temple in which we are gathered. Again and again you try, until your mind

has gone very deep; then you will see the temple just as it appears now to

your physical eyes. Invisible thoughts can be materialized into visual

experiences.

If you close your eyes, you cannot see your body, yet it is real to you. Why

think that the invisible self is unreal, just because you cannot see it? In

meditation you peer into the darkness behind closed eyes and center your

attention on the soul, the invisible self within you. Learning to control your

thoughts and interiorize your mind, by scientific guru-given techniques of

meditation, you will gradually develop spiritually: your meditations will

deepen and your invisible self, the soul-image of God within, will become

real to you. In this joyous awakening of Self-realization, the limited body

consciousness that was so real becomes unreal; and you know that you have

found your true invincible self and its oneness with God.

Realize Your Immortality Now

You will also understand how the invisible man is “tied” to the physical

body—by attachments, the mental and emotional cords of desires for

certain experiences on the physical plane. When by deeper meditation you

can untie those cords, he will be free and you will know that you are a real

image of God. Seek out that invisible man who is held captive in the jungle

of physical sensations and matter.

If you once understood the invisible man and the miracle of his outer

physical body, his secondary body of light, and his inner body of ideas, you

would realize what a wonderful creation you are! Concentrate on that

invisible you. The visible man is a delusion; the invisible man within is real.

When you know this you will know that you are not bones and flesh; you

are the indestructible invisible man.

You cannot die! Dwell no more on thoughts of growing older and being

ready for the grave. You are only getting ready for your immortal state!

Nothing dies. The ideational blueprint of your body is always present in the

ether. You feel that your loved ones who pass on are gone forever because

you haven’t the power of concentration necessary to behold them in their

subtle forms in the astral world where they are. Keep your mind on these

truths, repeating them to yourself whenever you have a quiet moment, “I

am a prototype of God’s thought. I am eternal, ever roaming in the kingdom

of God.” You are that deathless invisible man, and ever will be. Why not

realize your immortality now?

Your two physical eyes deceive you into thinking that this world of duality

is real. Open your spiritual eye and behold your invisible form. If in the

inner silence your spiritual eye is open, the invisible becomes visible.

Whenever you are thinking, dreaming, or concentrating deeply, you are that

invisible man. He is real; the visible man is the shadow. Forget the shadow

and remember the real. Be one with the invisible man—the reflection of

God.

1 Bhagavad Gita II:17.

2 See astral body in glossary.

3 The cosmic vibration, or Aum, structures all physical creation, including

the human body, through the manifestation of five tattwas (elements): earth,

water, fire, air, and ether. These are intelligent vibratory forces. Without the

earth element there would be no state of solid matter; without the water

element, no liquid state; without the air element, no gaseous state; without

the fire element, no heat; without the ether element, no background on

which to produce the cosmic motion picture show. The creative cosmic

vibration enters the body of man through the medulla, and is then divided

into the five elemental currents by the action of the five lower chakras, or

centers: the coccygeal (earth), sacral (water), lumbar (fire), dorsal (air), and

cervical (ether).

4 Great masters who have attained God-realization are able to arrange the

atoms at will to create any form they wish. Paramahansa Yogananda related

in his autobiography that his beloved guru, Swami Sri Yukteswar, appeared

before him in the flesh three months after his death. Not only was it a

visible form; Paramahansaji mentions embracing his guru “with an octopus

grip,” and detecting “the same faint, fragrant, natural odor which had been

characteristic of his body before.” Further, guru and disciple talked with

each other at length, as described in Autobiography of a Yogi, chapter 43,

“The Resurrection of Sri Yukteswar.” (Publisher’s Note)

What Are Ghosts?

Self-Realization Fellowship Temple, Hollywood, California, July 22, 1945

There are all kinds of tales about ghosts, devils, witches, vampires; and not

a few persons have claimed to have had various experiences with such

creatures. Of the several cases that have come to my attention, most of the

persons involved suffered from overly strong and diseased imaginations.

One of them, a woman, had chanced to read a book about vampires, and her

imaginings were so vivid that she believed one of them was sucking her

blood away each night. Whenever she visited me, she became well; but the

idea of the nightly presence of a vampire was so strong in her that after a

time she would become ill again. She died prematurely, destroyed by her

own thoughts.1

In the sixteenth century, belief in witchcraft was widespread, and hundreds

of persons suspected of being witches were falsely accused of being in

league with the devil and were put to death. Joan of Arc was burned at the

stake as one bewitched. Even Jesus Christ, who was healing the sick and

doing only good, was accused of being in touch with Beelzebub. It is true

that at various times evil spirits in possessed persons recognized Jesus and

spoke to him, saying, “Let us alone; what have we to do with thee, thou

Jesus of Nazareth? art thou come to destroy us? I know thee who thou art:

the Holy One of God.”2 Jesus himself spoke of Satan3 and of evil spirits,

which he exorcised from many persons, in one case casting the evil spirits

into the bodies of a herd of swine.4

There is another world, the astral, hidden behind this universe. Its

inhabitants are garbed in an astral form made of light. Lacking a physical

body, they are “ghosts,” invisible to us. Ordinarily they are confined to their

own sphere, just as we are limited to our own physical world. If it were a

simple matter for the ill-intentioned among astral beings to penetrate the

earth plane and hurt us, we would be living in terror all the time. There is

enough horror already on this earth of ours. Are not millions of deadly

germs floating around? Certainly God would not add the interference of

spooks to our sufferings!

There are, however, a few astral beings known as “tramp souls.” They are

earthbound because of strong attachments to the world, and are desirous of

entering a physical form for sense enjoyments. Such beings are usually

unseen; and they have no power to affect the ordinary person. Tramp souls

do occasionally succeed in entering and taking possession of someone’s

body and mind, but only when such a person is mentally unstable or has

weakened his mind by keeping it often blank or unthinking. It is like

leaving a car unlocked with the key in the ignition; some vagrant may get in

and drive off. Tramp souls want a free ride in someone else’s physical-body

vehicle—anyone’s—having lost their own that they were so attached to. It

was in such cases of possession that Jesus exorcised the vagrant spirits.

Tramp souls cannot stand the high vibration of spiritual thoughts and

consciousness. Sincere seekers after God who practice scientific methods of

prayer and meditation need never fear such beings. God is the Spirit of all

spirits. No harm from negative spirits can come to one whose thoughts are

on God.

The Triune Nature of Man

To understand better what astral beings are, let us first understand what we

are. When God created us, we existed first only as consciousness. We were

a creation of His mind. Is it not true that whenever you create something

new, the initial step is to visualize a model of it in your mind? Then you

gather together the materials, and finally you construct the tangible image

of your idea. In the same manner, we and everything in creation are triune:

mental (the idea), astral (the building material), and physical (the gross end-

product).

The physical body is made of 16 elements. How God combined the

chemical materials of physical elements to express intelligence is a marvel!

Nevertheless, this body is anything but perfect. We can conceive of a much

better one! I would like to create a body that would be like asbestos, able to

go through fire and not burn; one in which there could be no broken bones,

no unpleasant coughing. The physical body has pains and aches: its “spark

plugs” are often “missing”; first one part and then another gives out, and

finally the heart fails.

Americans like to get a new car every year, but they have to keep this old

body-model sixty or seventy years! Yet even when it is falling apart, still

you want to hang onto the model you have, until finally the Lord says,

“Come on, get out of it!” Then you spring from the worn-out physical form

and see that you are encased in a luminous body, an astral body of light and

energy.5 You rejoice to find that you can hear, you can see, you can touch;

and that your new form possesses no bones to be broken, no flesh to be

hurt.

Our astral body is composed of 19 elements, which are mental, emotional,

and lifetronic. These are intelligence; ego; feeling; mind (sense

consciousness); five instruments of knowledge (the subtle powers behind

the physical sense organs of sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch); five

instruments of action (the powers for the executive abilities to procreate,

excrete, talk, walk, and exercise manual skill); and five instruments of life

force (those empowered to perform the crystallizing, assimilating,

eliminating, metabolizing, and circulatory functions of the physical body).

These are all subtly made. We can hear, smell, taste, touch, and see in the

dream world through the power that is in the five senses. And in the astral

world, even without the physical organs of the ears, eyes, nose, tongue, and

skin, we still have with us the power of all five sense perceptions. The astral

body is weightless and travels as light travels. You can at will make the

astral body very small like an atom or you can make it very large. Why not?

God, the divine operator of the cosmic movie of creation, can enlarge or

reduce the size of the picture on the screen. He is the projectionist, running

the film from the booth of eternity. You are an individualized expression of

His infinite light. Your astral body is therefore much freer from the cosmic

limitations that so strongly bind the physical form.

But God had first to think of what materials He wanted to put into the

physical and astral bodies before He actually created them. We therefore

have also a causal or idea body of 35 elements: the 16 ideas that go to make

up the elements of the physical body, and the 19 ideas that constitute the

elements of the astral body. From the causal thought-forms the astral body’s

five instruments of life force make visible the astral body of light and the

physical body of gross matter. The following experiment illustrates the idea.

Close your eyes and visualize a horse on the left. At first your concept is

fuzzy, but if I suggest a white horse, you can more easily visualize it. Now

think of a black horse on the right side. You are creating mental or causal

images. Switch them about so that the white horse is on the right side. If

you can visualize a little more strongly, you will be able to see these

thought-forms as real images. That is what you do in a dream: your mind is

more concentrated then, causing your thought-forms to become visible to

you. Dreams and visions are astral in essence, being composed of light and

energy. Could you actually make the astral images of the black and white

horses true to the physical senses, you would have materialized a physical

creation.

So essentially we are made of 35 ideas, which make up the ideational or

causal body of man. Encased within the 35 thoughts is the spirit of God,

which is called the soul. Just as one flame emerges from the tiny openings

of a gas burner as many individual flames, so are we all one light, flowing

from God into many bodies.

At Death We Are Still Encased in the

Astral and Causal Bodies

When you die, your physical body of 16 elements disintegrates, but the 19

elements of your astral body remain intact. Where, then, are all those souls

who have left this earth? They are roaming in the ether. “That is

impossible,” you say. So let us make a comparison. If a primitive tribesman

came here and I told him that music is audible in the ether, he would laugh

at me, or perhaps become frightened; but if I then brought a radio and tuned

in a station where music was playing, he would no longer be able to deny

the truth of my statement. I could similarly show you right now that astral

beings are roaming in the ether, and you couldn’t deny it. The astral world

is right here, just behind the gross vibration of the physical cosmos.

If you were to behold the multitude of astral beings in the ether around you

at this moment, many of you would be afraid; and some of you would try to

seek among them your departed loved ones. If you concentrate deeply at the

spiritual eye you can view with inner vision that luminous world in which

are living all the souls who have gone on to the astral plane. In human

beings the heart acts as a receiving instrument and the spiritual eye as a

broadcasting station. Even if you cannot see your lost beloved ones, if you

can calmly concentrate your feeling on the heart, you can become aware of

the reassuring presence of those dear to you who are now in astral form,

enjoying their freedom from flesh thralldom.

I see many astral beings who have left the material plane, but they cannot

see me. I don’t make myself visible to them, but I can behold them if I so

desire.6

Therefore, we are not fully released at death when we depart from the

physical form. Our souls are still encased in the subtle astral and ideational

bodies. It is only when man dons a physical form that he becomes a visible

being in this world. After the death of his physical body, he remains in the

astral form as a “ghost”: an intelligent, invisible being, with essentially the

same mentality and characteristics he had on earth. Inhabitants of the astral

realms can of course see one another in their luminous bodies. But astral

beings are not ordinarily visible to us on earth unless we know how to

perceive the astral world through the spiritual eye. When souls shed the

astral body and go into a mental form in the causal world7 they are not

nonentities, but they do become truly invisible, even as ideas are invisible.

Jesus said, “Destroy this [body] temple and in three days I will raise it up.”8

He meant that he had to divest himself of the physical, astral, and mental

bodies (by casting out all vestiges of attachment to a form) to become one

with Spirit. It took three distinct efforts to do this.

If a departed soul has unfinished desires created while on the earth plane, it

continues to feel in the astral those desires and the wish to express itself

through a material body. And so that soul in its astral vehicle is drawn again

into a united sperm and ovum cell and is once more in a physical form.

The Intelligence in Prana Creates the Physical Body

The prana that permeates the physical body is intelligent life force

(“lifetrons”). The electricity that illuminates the light bulb does not create

the bulb; but the electricity or life force in the united human sperm and

ovum cells guides the embryonic and subsequent development of the entire

human body. Manifesting as the aforementioned five life forces of the astral

body, it is an intelligent or consciously directed force.

It is unwise to ascribe to yourself permanently any defect of your body.

Suppose you have lost an arm in this life, and the thought of that loss

becomes so impinged on your consciousness that you think you can never

again have the use of that arm. When you are reborn the next time, you

bring with you that consciousness of a missing arm; and if that negative

thought is strong enough it may inhibit the creative action of the intelligent

life force that grows the arms of your new body. You should therefore never

identify yourself with the flaws of your physical form. They do not belong

to you, for you are the pure, perfect image of God—the soul.

So you see, before you took on this physical form you were a ghost, and

when you die you will become a ghost again. We are also ghosts when we

sleep, for in sleep we are not aware of ourselves as a physical body at all.

Since you are a ghost when you are asleep, and you will be one after death,

why be afraid of ghosts? That is what you were and that is what you are

going to be. The only difference is that when you enter the astral world at

death you cannot create at will a physical body like the one you now have.

Only great masters who have attained oneness with the Divine Creator can

do so. Spiritually advanced souls can condense the subtle vibrations of the

astral vehicle into a tangible body.

Death Should Not Be Feared

We fear death because of pain, and because of the thought that we may

become obliterated. This idea is erroneous. Jesus showed himself in a

physical form to his disciples after his death. Lahiri Mahasaya returned in

the flesh the next day after he had entered mahasamadhi.9 They proved that

they were not destroyed. Just because instances of those who have mastered

the cosmic laws are few, one should not say that their testimony is not true.

You should not ignore the divine demonstrations of Jesus and my param-

paramguru10 Babaji; nor can I put aside the evidence of what I have seen—

my resurrected guru, Sri Yukteswarji11—or what I have experienced in

myself. “This soul in essence, the reflection of the Spirit, never undergoes

the throes of death or the pangs of birth; nor, having once known existence,

is it ever nonexistent. This soul was never born; it is everlastingly living,

untouched by the maya-magic of change. The soul is ever constant through

all cycles of bodily disintegrations.”12

Many times when some disciple living far away has been ill or dying, he

has drawn my astral body there through his devotion. One such incident

happened here. Seva Devi was a very devoted student. She became

extremely ill, but she never complained about it to anyone. She knew her

time had come to leave this earth. One day when I visited her in Los

Angeles she said to me, “Please don’t hold me here.”13 Later on, I was

staying in the Self-Realization Fellowship Hermitage in Encinitas for a

time. I had been given a radio and was waking up early in the mornings to

listen to broadcasts from India. One morning I suddenly felt intuitively the

subtle astral vibration of Seva Devi; she drew my astral body to her through

her devotion. My physical body was as dead. I was told later that Seva Devi

exclaimed, just before her passing, “Swamiji is here!” She was aware of

being consciously ushered by me into the other world.14 Some time

afterward I saw her glowing astral form; she was sitting in one of my

classes, just as real as she used to appear in life. If anyone had touched me

at that time, he would have seen her too. However, one who is in that state

of astral consciousness does not usually allow others to touch him.

We have passed through death and rebirth so many times, why be afraid of

death? It comes to free us. You shouldn’t wish for death, but be comforted

in the realization that it is our escape from so many troubles; it is a pension

after the hard work of life. I am making death very charming!

People also fear death because they have been in this cage of flesh so long

that they feel timid about leaving its security. But it is foolish to be afraid.

Just think, no more repaired tires on the body vehicle, no more patchwork

living. Since it is the Lord’s desire that we should have this old model until

death comes, we have to keep it and take care of it. But I wish the Lord

would give everyone the ability to go into samadhi and change his bodily

vehicle as easily as did rishi Narada. He was singing of God in divine

ecstatic communion; and when he returned to ordinary consciousness he

saw he had shed his old body and had “reincarnated” in a fresh new

youthful form. That is the highest form of transmigration.15

There is in India a story of a dying youth who, hearing the sobs of grief

around him, cried:

Insult me not with your cries of sympathy

When I soar

To the land of eternal light and love;

It is I who should feel for you.

For me, disease, shattering of bones,

Sorrow, excruciating heartaches no more.

I dream joy, I glide in joy, I breathe in joy evermore.

You don’t know what is going to come to you in this world; you have to go

on living and worrying. Those who die are pitying us; they are blessing us.

Why should you grieve for them? I told this to a woman who had lost her

son. When I finished explaining, she dried her tears immediately and said,

“Never before have I felt such peace. I am glad to know that my son is free.

I thought something awful had happened to him.”

It Is Possible to Enter and Leave the Body Consciously

Many spiritually developed persons can see their own astral body. St. John

says in the Bible, “And when I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead.”16 When

your astral body ascends, or leaves the body, at death, you see your physical

body as dead. That same experience occurs when advanced yogis transcend

the physical body at will. Thus John, though living, saw his material form

as dead during the samadhi he describes. It is fun to get in and out of the

body this way. But many persons who think they can do so are only

imagining it. Just because you think it is so doesn’t make it so. You have to

know the technique.

One man in New York came to me and assured me that he could travel

astrally. “I don’t think you can,” I said. “You are only imagining you can do

so.” Still he insisted that I test him. “All right,” I agreed, “go downstairs

astrally and tell me what is in the restaurant there.” He was quiet for a

moment; then he told me, “There is a big piano in the right-hand corner.” I

knew he was imagining it, for I had observed that his breathing was normal

and so was his pulse.17 “On the contrary,” I said, “I think you will find

there two women sitting at a table.” He laughed at me. Then we both went

down into the restaurant. No piano stood in the corner, but two women were

seated at a table there. At last he understood that he had been fooled by his

own imagination.

Often I see with the inner astral vision happenings in the war in Europe, but

it seems like a picture show. The world was meant to entertain us, not to

torture us. God has made His motion picture of creation very complex, full

of contrasts of good and evil. When you go to a movie you like to see lots

of excitement. Think how many times you have gone to view a murder

mystery; and when the movie ended you said to yourself, “That was a good

show!” Learn to look upon this movie of life with the same sense of

detachment and enjoyment.

There is a lesson to be learned from the fact that we are now encaged in the

human body, and that at night and when we die we become ghosts. We must

learn to know our ghostly nature, our invisible, powerful nature. But you

cannot do so if you are always concentrating on the body: “I have a

headache, I want this and that, I dislike spinach.” Preoccupation with

material concerns is what you must overcome. How can you do this? Make

God the first thought in your life. So long as you keep Him in second place

He will not come to you. Gold, wine, and sex were created to hold you to

this world; the Lord uses them as tests to see whether you prefer them to

His love.

The Power of Black Magic Is in Your Thought

In addition to the fear of ghosts, some people have a dread of black magic

and other black arts. Many people tell me that somebody they know is using

black magic on them. I say to them, “You are sitting in the castle of God.

No one can harm you if you truly believe in God.” But when you believe in

the negative thought that somebody is injuring you, you give him the power

to do so. Suppose someone is sending you a wrong thought, and you accept

it; it will hurt you. But you do not have to accept evil ideas. Don’t be afraid

of malicious persons; no one can affect you unless you are fearful. Fear and

keeping the mind blank allow evil to enter; but when you say, “God is with

me,” nothing but good can come to you from the thoughts of others. Wrap

yourself in the thought of God. His holy Name is the Power of all powers.

Like a shield it deflects all negative vibrations.

The Cosmic War of Good and Evil

Why be concerned about the negligible threat of the powers of tramp-soul

ghosts, or practitioners of the black arts? At every moment a far greater

danger to our happiness and well-being exists right within us and around us.

Two forces are fighting—the one to save us, and the other to hurt us. We are

caught in the cosmic war between good and evil.

This world is ruled by invisibilities or ghosts: God the Father, Christ

Consciousness, the seven spirits before the throne of God;18 and Satan and

his legion of evil powers. The seven spirits before the throne of God are the

principal intelligent forces of creation: Holy Ghost (the prime creative

vibratory power of God, Aum, or Amen) and its six individualized creative

powers that structure and maintain the physical, astral, and causal universes

and the physical, astral, and causal bodies of man.

Originally, Satan was an archangel.19 He was given the power to create the

world according to God’s plan. After he had completed his assignment, he

was to go back to God, as God intended all creation to return to Him. But if

this intelligent power, personified in the scriptures as Satan, were to retire

into Spirit, creation would disappear. To prevent this, Satan implanted evil

(that is, material) desires in man, fulfillment of which would necessitate

man’s return to earth again and again, thus keeping the machinery of

creation going. In this way the devil tries to see to it that man doesn’t get a

chance to go back to God.

There is a great tug-of-war between the devil and God. One cannot dismiss

the problem by thinking that Satan is a mere delusion. God would be very

ignorant if He didn’t know about the evil in the world. And why did Jesus

say: “Get thee behind me, Satan” and “Deliver us from evil” if there is no

Satan? Why is it necessary to pray to God at all if there is no devil? Evil

does exist.

When the Lord created man, He created the devil too. Satan, with his power

of maya, exists in order to test the children of God. Unless fire melts iron,

steel cannot be forged. When disease or suffering comes, you should realize

that it is a test of God’s maya. You must pass these tests. You must not be

upset by them. Though Jesus was suffering on the cross, he surmounted that

divine test. Many great souls have died of terrible diseases and suffering.

Saint Teresa of Avila was afflicted with tuberculosis, and yet she said, “I

don’t want the Lord to shorten my trials. I want to suffer bravely and work

as long as I can.” And when her body died she was lifted up in Christ.

This creation is the Lord’s hobby. But I constantly plead with Him, “Why

do You have such a hobby? Why do You give us such troubles?” Our earth

is one of the worst places in creation. There are far better dwelling places

than this. But though God allows troubles to exist, He also tries to help us

out of them. God and His angels and millions of good spirits are trying to

establish their order of divine harmony on earth. Every beneficial quality is

created by a good spirit. Good spirits are constantly casting the seeds of

helpful thoughts into the soil of your mind. At the same time, Satan, the

king of darkness, with his evil spirits is creating disorder and trouble in the

world. Who but Satan created disease germs? There have been various

plagues, then tuberculosis, and now the latest destroyer is cancer—all

diabolical methods of torturing human beings. But God is inspiring many

researchers to find new ways to banish disease.

The Temptation of Adam and Eve

To hold man to earth life, Satan created sex; that temptation has been with

man since the beginning of time. The Lord created man and woman by will

power; their bodies were materializations of His divine wisdom and love.20

Man and woman originally had the same power as He to create children by

mental fiat. Adam and Eve were empowered by Him to propagate the

species by immaculate or divine means. As my guru Sri Yukteswarji

explained, the evil force, Satan, tempted Eve to taste the fruit (sex) in the

midst of the garden (body).21 God had said that the original man and

woman were to enjoy all the sensations of the tree of life (astral spinal

centers of consciousness and energy that enliven the body and the senses)

except the experience of sex, which is in the midst, or center, of the body

garden. The “serpent” that tempted Eve is the coiled-up spinal energy that

feeds and stimulates the sex nerves. When the emotion or Eve-

consciousness in any human being is overpowered by the sex impulse, his

reason or Adam also succumbs.

Sexual pleasure is a delusive counterpart of God’s bliss. Thus when sex is

divorced from faithful love, and used only to gratify lustful instincts, it

becomes a tool of the devil to keep man’s consciousness locked in the

senses, unable to experience God-consciousness, or realization of the Self

as Spirit: ever-existing, ever-conscious, ever-new Joy. Sex and desire for

wine and money—these are the counterfeits created by Satan to displace the

ecstasy of the soul. When Adam and Eve tasted of the sex sensation, they

fell from Paradise; they lost that divine consciousness by which they could

feel their oneness with God in soul ecstasy, and they were forced out of the

garden of Eden. Ever since, human beings have had to reproduce their kind

the sexual way, like the animals. Women give birth in a troublesome and

painful manner. Then, too, husband and wife have to accept what they get;

if a bad child comes, they must rear it. Originally they were able to create

what they wanted, through the power of mind, just as God does. What

happy days of pristine innocence!

Listen Only to the Voice of God

In the ultimate sense even Satan is really a tool of God. Satan fails to keep

his promises to man, and then the disillusioned person seeks the faithful

Lord. Why wait for disillusionment? I urge you not to put all your eggs of

happiness in one basket. When you are physically strong and well and

reasonably contented, suddenly pain comes and you think, “My goodness,

what is this?” Self-Realization Fellowship teaches you not to put all your

hopes for happiness in the frail basket of your body and the pleasures of this

world. How? By teaching you to master the body; and, above all, by

teaching you to meditate.

Listen to the voice of God through your good thoughts. God and His

angelic spirits are creating these good thoughts; the devil is creating his

own kind of thoughts. Every time a bad thought comes, cast it out. Then

Satan can’t do anything to you. But as soon as you think wrongly, you go

toward Satan. You are constantly moving back and forth between good and

evil; to escape, you must go where Satan will be unable to reach you: deep

in the heart of God.

1 In the presence of a God-conscious master such as Paramahansa

Yogananda, receptive devotees are often healed of mental or physical

illness. Permanent cure usually depends on the continued faith and

receptivity of the person healed. Those who revert to wrong thinking, as

this woman did, permit the illness to return. (Publisher’s Note)

2 Luke 4:34.

3 Luke 4:1–13.

4 Luke 8:26–33.

5 There are many planes or spheres in the astral world, constituting the

heaven or hell of life after death. “In my Father’s house are many

mansions” (John 14:2). A person’s good behavior while on earth draws him

to one of the higher spheres of light, peace, and joy. Evil deeds attract one

to a lower, dark sphere where his experiences may be akin to hellish

nightmares. One remains in the astral world for a karmically predetermined

time, and then again takes rebirth on earth in physical form.

6 Great masters watch over their disciples on the astral and causal planes as

well as on earth. Such masters can and do materialize in physical or astral

form in response to the soul call of a true devotee; but at their own wise

discretion. We find an example in Lahiri Mahasaya’s summoning

Mahavatar Babaji to appear before doubting friends, described in

Autobiography of a Yogi, chapter 34.

7 When souls are free from physical desires, they need no longer

reincarnate on earth. Such souls then migrate between the astral world and

the causal “heaven,” reincarnating in the astral until spiritual freedom is

attained from that state also. When all causal desires are overcome one

becomes a liberated or free soul.

8 John 2:19.

9 The last meditation, during which a master consciously casts off his
physical body and merges himself in Spirit, is called the maha, or great,
samadhi.
10 Guru of one’s guru’s guru. (See paramguru and Gurus of Self-
Realization Fellowship in glossary.)
11 See Autobiography of a Yogi, chapter 43, “The Resurrection of Sri
Yukteswar.”
12 Bhagavad Gita II:20.
13 Through intercession with God, great masters are able to prolong the
stay of a disciple on earth.
14 This is one of the promises of the sacred guru-disciple relationship; at
the time of the disciple’s death the guru is present to usher him into his new
life in the astral world.
15 Transmigration, or the passing of the soul at death from one form to
reincarnation in another, follows the natural upward evolution of life,
without regression to lower life forms. The Hindu scriptures teach that the
soul evolves from the mineral kingdom through the plant and then the
animal kingdoms before reaching incarnation in a human form. Thereafter,
through repeated cycles of human births and deaths, with their intermittent
lessons, the soul ultimately finds perfect expression in the superman, the
man of God-realization.
16 Revelation 1:17.
17 Conscious “astral travel” is possible only when one enters a deep state of
samadhi in which the consciousness is expanded into the superconscious
perception of the all-seeing spiritual eye. Through the spiritual eye one can
behold any point of space in this world or the astral, and project his
consciousness there. One who is advanced enough may also materialize
anywhere his astral or even his physical form, which is known as
bilocation. In this state of astral samadhi the breath and heartbeat are still,
and the body is in an immobile trancelike condition. Only when a master

has attained the highest spirituality, nirbikalpa samadhi, can his physical

body continue to function in a normal way while he is inwardly engaged in

divine ecstasy.

18 Revelation 1:4.

19 “And he said unto them, I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven”

(Luke 10:18).

“Know thou that all manifestations of sattva (good), rajas (activity), and

tamas (evil) emanate from Me. Though they are in Me, I am not in them”

(Bhagavad Gita VII:12).

20 Man expresses more the aspect of reason, with feeling hidden; woman

expresses more the aspect of feeling, with reason less predominant.

21 Genesis 3:3.

Jesus: A Christ of East and West

First Self-Realization Fellowship Temple, Encinitas, California, September

18, 1938

Self-Realization Fellowship Temple, San Diego, California, February 4,

1945

(Compilation)

Jesus Christ is a liaison between East and West. That great master stands

before my eyes, telling Orient and Occident: “Come together! My body was

born in the East; my spirit and message traveled to the West.” In Christ’s

birth as an Asiatic, and his acceptance by Western peoples as their guru, is a

divine implication that East and West should unite by exchanging their

finest distinctive features. It is part of the drama of God that the West was

meant to have material power, and the East, spiritual power, so that amity

might come through an interchange of their characteristic qualities. The

spiritual freedom of the East overrides material suffering. The West needs

that kind of spiritual freedom; God’s Western children, being more

fortunate physically and materially, need to develop spiritually and to

receive the spiritual illumination of the East. And the East needs Western

material development; God’s Eastern children should welcome the help of

the West, that they may industrialize Asia, and thus enable her to develop

and use her resources to fullest advantage.

The American way of living progressively, plus the spirituality of India—

you cannot beat that combination. India is the melting pot of religions;

America, the melting pot of nations. America became great because of her

love of liberty and because she welcomed all races to her shores—she

absorbed the best of all nations. No other country was founded on and has

grown on such wonderful ideals; the freedom and exceptional way of life

that have been created in America by these ideals must never be lost.

Many in the West believe that Easterners are materially poor because they

are spiritually wealthy. This is not true. And many Easterners believe that

Westerners are spiritually poor because they are materially rich. This is not

the case either. The truth is that we human beings become too one-sided; we

need to seek a balance by drawing the best from one another.

Jesus is a divine colossus standing between Orient and Occident, telling

East and West to exchange their better qualities. Can you see him there? I

see him. He urges the West to spiritualize itself and the East to industrialize

itself—the East to accept the Western missionaries of science and industry,

and the West to accept the Eastern missionaries of the Spirit. To the West he

says: “Love your Eastern brothers. I came from the Orient.” To the East he

pleads: “Love your Western brothers; they have received and loved me, an

Oriental.” Isn’t that a beautiful thought? It would make a magnificent

picture.

Christ is not the property of either East or West—an East-West bond is

manifested in his life. He belongs to both, and to all the world. His

universality is what makes him so wonderful. Jesus took the body of an

Oriental so that in being accepted as guru by the Occidental he would

thereby symbolically draw East and West together. Those in the West who

have adopted Christ as their own should remember that he was an Oriental.

Love and sympathy for Jesus should be expanded into love and sympathy

for all Orientals, and for all the world.

God does not prefer Orientals or Occidentals. He loves those who manifest

His spiritual qualities. Why, then, was it ordained by God that Christ, a

great savior of mankind, came out of the East? God wanted to come with

the downtrodden, to show the transcendence of Spirit over matter. We

should not conclude that it is necessary to be poor to be Christlike; if Jesus

had come in a prosperous country, it would be equally foolish to reason that

Christ Consciousness can be attained through material things, or that God

favors the materially rich. A balance between spirituality and material

development is necessary.

The ideals of Christ are the ideals of the scriptures of India. The precepts of

Jesus are analogous to the highest Vedic teachings, which were in existence

long before the advent of Jesus. This does not take away from the greatness

of Christ; it shows the eternal nature of truth, and that Jesus incarnated on

earth to give to the world a new expression of Sanatan Dharma (eternal

religion, the eternal principles of righteousness).1 In the Book of Genesis

we find an exact parallel of the older Hindu concept of the genesis of our

universe. The Ten Commandments of Moses, many of the Biblical legends

and figures and rituals, the miracles performed by Christ, the very basics of

Christian doctrine, all have concomitance with the earlier Vedic literature of

India. The teachings of Christ in the New Testament and of Krishna in the

Bhagavad Gita have an exact correspondence.2

The True Nature of the Star of the East

The parallelisms of Christ’s teachings with Yoga-Vedanta doctrines strongly

support the records known to exist in India, which state that Jesus lived and

studied there during fifteen of the unaccounted-for years of his life—no

mention is made of him in the New Testament from his twelfth to thirtieth

year. Jesus journeyed to India to return the visit of the three “wise men from

the east” who came to pay homage to him at his birth.3 They were guided

to the Christ Child by the divine light of a star—not a physical luminary,

but the star of the omniscient spiritual eye. This “third eye” can be seen

within the forehead, between the eyebrows, by the deeply meditating

devotee. The spiritual eye is a metaphysical telescope through which one

can see to infinity in all directions simultaneously, beholding with

omnipresent spherical vision whatever is happening in any point of

creation. The spiritual eye has been mentioned in the teachings of India, and

Jesus referred to it, too: “The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine

eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.”4 Brought thus to the

stable in Bethlehem by the guiding light of the spiritual eye, the Wise Men

recognized and honored the infant Christ for the great soul and divine

incarnation that he was. During the unknown period of his life Jesus repaid

their visit.

Even in the name and title of Jesus we find Sanskrit words with a

corresponding sound and meaning. The words Jesus and Isa (pronounced

“Isha”) are substantially the same. Is, Isa, and Iswara all refer to the Lord,

or Supreme Being. “Jesus” derives from the Greek form of the name Joshua

or Jeshua, a contraction of Jehoshua, “help of Jehovah” or “Savior.”5

The title “Christ” is also found in India—it was perhaps given to Jesus there

—in the word “Krishna,” which sometimes I purposely spell “Christna” to

show the correlation. “Christ” and “Krishna” are titles signifying divinity,

meaning that these two avatars were one with God. While residing in

physical form their consciousness expressed oneness with the Christ

Consciousness (Sanskrit Kutastha Chaitanya), the Intelligence of God

omnipresent in creation.6 This consciousness is also called the “only

begotten son of God” because it is the sole perfect reflection in creation of

the Uncreated Infinite.

To understand what Christ Consciousness means, consider the contrast

between your consciousness and that of a little ant. The ant’s awareness is

limited by the minuscule size of his body; your consciousness resides

throughout your relatively capacious form. If anyone touches any part of

your body you are aware of it. Creation is the body of God, and His

consciousness omnipresent therein is called the Christ Consciousness. He is

aware of whatever we do within His universal form, just as we are

conscious of our little selves. Through oneness with that Christ

Consciousness Jesus was able to know, without being told, that Lazarus was

dead.

The wonders of God’s creation cannot be discovered by a cow; it is the

unique potential of human beings to attain the omniscience of oneness with

Christ Consciousness. I ask those who do not believe in God: “Whence

came the intelligence in man and in the universe, if it is not produced in

some divine ‘Factory’ hidden behind the ether?” Such mysteries prompted

Einstein to say that space looks very suspicious. Space is concealing God;

His Intelligence is hidden there, for out of the “nothingness” of space comes

everything.

Being one with this Intelligence, which guides every atom in creation, Jesus

could materialize his form anywhere he wished. And he can still do so, just

as he used to appear every night to St. Francis in Assisi. Jesus was

conscious not only of his microcosmic physical form, but also of all

creation as his macrocosmic body; he could truthfully say: “I and my Father

are one.”7 He experienced his presence in all atoms, even as does his

Father. Jesus alluded to the omnipresent Christ Consciousness when he

said, “Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not

fall on the ground without [the sight of] your Father.”8

Christ came at a critical time in history, when the world was sorely in need

of spiritual hope and regeneration.9 His message was not intended to foster

multifarious sects, each claiming him as their own. His was a universal

message of unity, one of the grandest ever given. He reminded mankind that

it is written in the scriptures, “Ye are gods”;10 and St. John voiced the

inspiration and spirit of Christ’s teaching when he said, “But as many as

received him [the Christ Consciousness manifested in Jesus and in all

creation], to them gave he power to become the sons of God.”11 Was there

ever a greater message? Jesus assured the downtrodden, the white and the

dark man, the Oriental and the Occidental, that they are all children of God;

whoever is pure in heart, no matter what his race or color, can receive the

Lord.

The charcoal and the diamond receive the same rays of the sun, but the

diamond reflects their radiance. So, both in the Orient and the Occident,

those who have diamond mentalities shall reflect God and be called the

sons of God, and those who keep themselves dark with evil qualities shall

not be able to reflect His light.

Train Your Heart to Feel the Brotherhood of Man

All mankind should open its heart to Jesus’ great message: “[God] hath

made of one blood all nations of men.”12 That is the Christ inspiration I

love so much. I want to make that message a living reality, to give it a

practical application. Color prejudice is the most foolish of all man’s

displays of ignorance. Color is only skin deep. God gave darker skin

pigment to races that originally lived under climatic conditions requiring

greater protection from the sun, a purely practical measure; therefore white,

olive, yellow, red, or black skin is nothing to be particularly proud of. After

all, the soul wears a bodily overcoat of one color in one lifetime and other

hues in other incarnations. So the color of one’s complexion is a very

superficial thing. To have any color prejudice is to discriminate against

God, who is sitting in the hearts of all the red, white, yellow, olive, and

black peoples of the world. Besides, it is well to remember that whoever

hates any race will surely reincarnate in that bodily form; thus does the

karmic law force man to overcome his soul-stifling prejudices. Train your

heart to feel the brotherhood of man—that is most important.

Although Jesus’ teachings were preordained to establish their strongest

foundation in the West, he chose an incarnation in an Oriental body, and in

the Jewish race, which has had a long history of persecution, because he

wanted to demonstrate the folly of judging others according to distinctions

of race and color. True Christianity must be lived; racial divisions must be

banished. Prejudices and lack of real brotherhood are causes of war and

disunion among God’s children. We must work at eradicating all

incitements to war; in hate and prejudice lie bombs and misery. Jesus

warned: “...for all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.”13 It

is not the sword, but the practice of Christ principles that shall ultimately

free the world. In the highest sense, God alone protects you. You can best

help this world by ideal living, as taught by Christ and all spiritually

enlightened ones. Above all else, love God; don’t you see that the whole

answer is in His hands? When He will push aside the screen of mystery, you

will see the answer to all that was theretofore obscure and unfathomable.

Some Westerners consider the Hindus heathens; they don’t know that many

Hindus consider Westerners heathens also—ignorance is fifty-fifty

everywhere. I am sometimes asked if I believe in Jesus. I reply: “Why such

a question? We in India reverence Jesus and his teachings, perhaps more

than you do.”

In order to love Christ you must live what he taught, you must follow the

example of his life. Jesus said: “...whosoever shall smite thee on thy right

cheek, turn to him the other also.”14 India has practiced this teaching more

than any other nation. Many who call themselves Christian do not even

apply it; they say that it is a beautiful philosophy, but if you were to slap

them they would return twelve slaps, a kick, and maybe a bullet! Anyone

who so retaliates is not a true Christian, or lover of Christ, for that is not the

spirit of the all-forgiving Jesus.

Every time you see the symbol of the Cross it should remind you of what it

stands for—that you must bear your crosses with right attitude, even as

Jesus did. When you mean well and still you are misunderstood or

mistreated, instead of being angry you should say, as did Christ: “Father,

forgive them for they know not what they do.” Why forgive one who

wrongs you? Because if you angrily strike back you misrepresent your own

divine soul nature—you are no better than your offender. But if you

manifest spiritual strength you are blessed, and the power of your righteous

behavior will also help the other person to overcome his misunderstanding.

Those eternal principles of truth and righteousness taught by Jesus we take

very seriously in India—we take them literally, without rationalizing them

to suit our purposes. Jesus said: “And everyone that hath forsaken houses,

or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for

my name’s sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting

life.”15 That spirit of renunciation for God is all-pervasive in India.

Especially in olden days it was the ideal of every man to give at least one

part of his lifetime to God alone.

God Does Not Like to Be Forgotten

Complete renunciation is not necessary for everyone, but if you forget God

while fulfilling your material duties, God will not like it. Give time to Him

alone, without work. I always save time in the morning and night for God,

and the rest of the day I serve Him wholeheartedly. The Lord says in the

Gita: “Whatever actions thou dost perform...dedicate them all as offerings

to Me. Thus no action of thine can enchain thee with good or evil

karma.”16 You came on this earth for God. It is His world, not yours. You

are here to work for Him. Life will very much disappoint and disillusion

you if you labor only for yourself, because eventually you will have to

leave everything; you will be forced to practice renunciation then!

The message of Christ is one of compassion and forgiveness, renunciation

(in spirit if one cannot do it in actuality), morality, brotherly love and unity

and equality, and supreme love for God. Remember Jesus’ admonition:

“And why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?”17

The authenticity of the life of Christ has been questioned by many

agnostics. Some have propounded the theory that Jesus was legendary, his

life a mere fictitious drama. I know that Christ is real, for I have seen him

many times.

Jesus was not as fair complexioned as most of you in the West. He had dark

skin. And his eyes were not pale blue, as many artists paint them; they were

dark. Nor was his hair blond; it also was dark.

A Vision of Christ at the Yogoda School in India

One day at my school in Ranchi, I was sitting with the young boys when I

saw someone coming toward us, from behind the boys, and wondered who

it was. Then I saw it was Jesus; his feet were not touching the ground as he

approached. He came very close to us and then vanished.

A few years later, in Boston, I again saw Jesus. I was meditating and deeply

praying to God because I felt that for three days I had forgotten Him—I had

been so engrossed in fulfilling the responsibilities He had given to me. I

told the Lord: “I am going to walk out of this work!” The right attitude is to

love God and love His work because of Him. Those who do missionary

service, but never make the effort to meditate or commune with God, never

find Him. Because I felt that the activities of my ministry had taken me

away from God, I prayed, “Lord, I will go away. I will not remain in

America and do Your work unless I know You are with me.” Then a Voice

came through the ether like a beam of light: “What do you want? You

cannot go.” Many times in my life God has thus prevented me from

carrying out my desire to run away from my duties to this cause, to be only

with Him. I replied to the Divine Voice: “Let me see, on a sea of gold,

Krishna and Jesus and their disciples.” Even as I made this inward request, I

saw those divine ones coming toward me! “It is a hallucination,” I thought.

“If the person meditating with me sees this also, then I shall believe.”

Instantly my companion exclaimed aloud: “Oh, I see Christ and Krishna!”

Then I rationalized, “This is thought transference.” I was doubting and

praying to God to help my unbelief when the Voice said: “When I leave, the

room will become filled with the fragrance of the lotus, and whoever comes

shall notice it.” As the vision vanished, the whole room became permeated

with a marvelous lotus essence. Others entering the room even hours later

noted the aroma. I could doubt no longer.

Mahavatar Babaji ordained that I come to America to interpret the teachings

of Christ for the purpose of showing their parallelism with the yoga

teachings of India’s Lord Krishna. In the immortal truths expressed by these

two avatars lies the answer of the ages. That is why Babaji, who is in divine

communion with Christ, gave me the special dispensation of carrying this

message to the West.

So long as breath will be in the body, I will try to bring East and West

together to fulfill the purpose for which Christ came on earth in an Oriental

body. His soul in the West, his body in the East; bringing soul and body

together unites East and West.

Truth Is a Universal Experience

Help to spread the message of Self-Realization Fellowship. There is nothing

vague or mystical about Self-Realization teachings. You can realize these

truths for yourself. Truth is truth, and it is a universal experience. After I

heard my guru, Sri Yukteswarji, teach, I could see the blemishes in the talks

of those who tried to make me understand something they did not

understand themselves. A salesman should never try to sell something he

does not believe in. One should teach only those things he has practiced and

experienced.

Devotees of this path should sincerely study the Self-Realization Lessons

and meditate deeply each night before going to bed. Jesus promised to send

the Holy Ghost, the Great Comforter.18 Through the practice of the Self-

Realization techniques of meditation, the faithful student is enabled to

realize the fulfillment of that promise. Worshiping Jesus is not truly

meaningful until one can expand his consciousness to receive within

himself the Christ Consciousness. That is the second coming of Christ.

Unless you do your part, a thousand Christs come on earth would not be

able to save you. You have to work for your own salvation. Then Christ can

help you.

The first two lines of Rudyard Kipling’s poem became famous: “East is

East and West is West, and never the twain shall meet....” But just because I

eat curry and you eat apple pie, why should there be division between us?

Division is imaginary lines drawn by small minds. It is the result of

superiority complexes, and is the cause of wars and pernicious troubles. We

must destroy division. Look to the example of the great Christ who came in

the East and stands as a lofty ideal before both East and West, telling them,

“Here am I in the midst of you; learn from one another, balance your

spirituality and material development.” There he stands—a Christ of East

and West—linking the two hemispheres with this message of unity. Can you

not see him?

1 The Sankhya philosophy defines true religion as “those immutable

principles that protect man permanently from the threefold suffering of

disease, unhappiness, and ignorance.”

2 Many parallel references are noted and analyzed in Autobiography of a

Yogi.

3 “Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod

the king, behold there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, saying,

Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the

east, and are come to worship him” (Matthew 2:1–2).

4 Matthew 6:22.

5 Ref. Smith’s Dictionary of the Bible; De Wolfe, Fiske and Co.; Boston,

Mass.

6 There are many derivations given to the word “Krishna,” the most

common of which is “dark,” referring to the hue of Krishna’s complexion

(He is often shown as dark blue to connote divinity. Blue is also the color of

the Christ Consciousness when epitomized in the spiritual eye as a circle of

dark blue light surrounding the star mentioned earlier in this talk.)

According to M. V. Sridatta Sarma (“On the Advent of Sri Krishna”), of the

various other meanings given to the word “Krishna,” several are found in

the Brahmavaivarta Purana. He states that according to one of these

derivations, “Krsna means the Universal Spirit. Krsi denotes a generic term,

while na conveys the idea of the self, thus bringing forth the meaning

‘Omniscient Spirit.’” In this we find a parallel to the Christ Consciousness

as the Intelligence of God omnipresent in creation. It is of interest that a

colloquial Bengali rendering of “Krishna” is Krista (cf. Greek Christos and

Spanish Cristo). (Publisher’s Note)

John 10:30.
Matthew 10:29.
In the Bhagavad Gita the Lord says: “O Bharata (Arjuna)! whenever
virtue (dharma) declines and vice (adharma) predominates, I incarnate as an
Avatar. In visible form I appear from age to age to protect the virtuous and
to destroy evildoing in order to reestablish righteousness.” (IV:7–8).
John 10:34.
John 1:12.
Acts 17:26.
Matthew 26:52.
Matthew 5:39.
Matthew 19:29.
IX:27–28.
Luke 6:46.
John 14:16, 26; 15:26. (See “Seek God in Solitude.”)

Christ and Krishna: Avatars of the One Truth

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, January 15, 1933, and April 14, 1935

(Compilation)

He is a master whose consciousness has been refined to receive and reflect

perfectly the light of God. The sun shines equally on a piece of charcoal and

a diamond, but only the diamond reflects the sun’s light. God’s light also

shines equally on all stages of life, but the reflection is greater from some

than from others. The divine light is fully reflected by the man of

realization.

Every human being is essentially a soul, covered with a veil of maya.

Through evolution and self-effort, man makes a little hole in the veil; in

time, he makes the hole bigger and bigger. As the opening enlarges, his

consciousness expands; the soul becomes more manifest. When the veil is

completely torn away, the soul is fully manifest in him. That man has

become a master—master of himself and of maya.

The great ones are not specially manufactured by God. They became

masters through their own efforts. They had to work and fight for liberation,

just as all the rest of mankind is struggling toward the light of soul freedom.

Divine incarnations such as Jesus Christ and Jadava1 Krishna had

somewhere, sometime, developed that spiritual stature which foredestined

their birth as avatars.2 Such beings are free from the karmic compulsions of

rebirth; they return to earth only to help liberate mankind.

Even though liberated, the divine ones play, at God’s behest, their human

roles in the seeming reality of the earth-life drama. They have their

weaknesses, their struggles and temptations, and then, through righteous

battle and right behavior, they attain victory. In this way they show that all

men can be and are meant to be spiritually victorious over the forces that

would keep them from realizing their inherent oneness with God.

A Christ and a Krishna created perfect by God, without any effort of self-

evolution on their part, and merely pretending to struggle and overcome

their trials on earth, could not be examples for suffering humans to follow.

The fact that the great ones too were once such mortals, but overcame,

makes them pillars of strength and inspiration for stumbling mankind.

When we know that divine avatars, in order to make themselves perfect,

once had to go through the same kinds of human trials and experiences that

we do, it gives us hope in our own struggle.

A God-realized master is known by his spiritual deeds. Miracles are not the

most important of these. Some of the miracles that Christ performed can be

duplicated in other ways by scientists today. On the spiritual side, Christ

himself said: “He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also;

and greater works than these shall he do.”3 Miracles such as you have heard

about I have seen demonstrated many times by the masters; but these are

not the criterion of their greatness. The power to perform miracles comes

naturally to those who know God, because they are in tune with His cosmic

laws; but those who become attached to miracles will lose Him. God alone

must be the goal of our hearts. A master’s most important spiritual

accomplishment is the conquering of maya, delusion: the attainment of that

realization which makes God supreme in one’s life—more important than

life itself.

Christ performed his greatest miracle when he allowed himself to suffer on

the cross, saying, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”4

He could have retaliated with spiritual power and saved himself. His victory

has immortalized him as an example for the ages. If he was able to

overcome his mortal consciousness to express divinity, other men can do

the same.

The manifestation of God in the life of divine beings is sometimes

measured in terms of the quantitative and qualitative good they do. But

great ones who fully manifest God are equally one with Him. So it is

impossible to make comparisons between the masters (or avatars), and

foolish to try, because being one with God they are all the same; they are all

equal before Him.

But to me Krishna and Christ stand supreme. By the greatness of his loving

sacrifice, Christ has influenced the whole world. Krishna manifested a

different aspect of the Infinite Father. In contradistinction to Christ, who

was a renunciant, Krishna was a king; and I bow to one who can be a king

and remain a divine one at the same time. To be in the world but not of the

world is very difficult, for you live in the midst of temptations and desires

and yet must remain untouched by them.

Krishna came on earth much earlier than Christ, about three thousand years

before, some scholars say. The lives of Christ and Krishna have not only a

great spiritual concomitance; there are also parallels in the personal stories

that come down to us. Both Jesus and Krishna were born of devout, God-

loving parents. Krishna’s parents were persecuted by his wicked uncle,

King Kansa; King Herod’s threats tormented the mother and father of Jesus.

Jesus has been likened to a good shepherd; Krishna, during his early years

in hiding from Kansa, was a cowherd. Jesus conquered Satan; Krishna

conquered the demon Kaliya.5 Jesus stopped a storm on the sea to save a

ship carrying his disciples; Krishna, to prevent his devotees and their cattle

from being drowned in a deluge of rain, lifted Mt. Gowardhan over them

like an umbrella.

Jesus was called “King of the Jews,” though his kingdom was not of this

world; Krishna was an earthly king as well as a divine one. Jesus had

women disciples, Mary, Martha, and Mary Magdalene, who helped him and

played a vital role in his mission; Krishna’s women disciples, Radha and the

gopis (milkmaids), similarly played divine roles. Jesus was crucified by

being nailed to a cross; Krishna was mortally wounded by a hunter’s arrow.

The destinies of both were prophesied in the scriptures. These two avatars,

both Orientals, are generally recognized in the West and East respectively

as the supreme incarnations of God.

Jesus Christ and Bhagavan Krishna gave to the world two of the greatest

books of all times. The words of Lord Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita and of

Lord Jesus in the New Testament of the Bible are sublime manifestations of

truth, great models of spiritual scripture. These two bibles give essentially

the same teaching. The deeper Christianity that was preached by Jesus has

been lost sight of today. Christ taught devotion and yoga, as did Krishna;

and it was my param-paramguru, Mahavatar Babaji, who first spoke of

showing the unity of Christ’s teaching and Krishna’s Yoga philosophy.6 To

fulfill this mission is the special dispensation given to me by Babaji.

The Universal Consciousness

I am glad that Christianity was not called “Jesusism,” because Christianity

is a much broader word. There is a difference of meaning between Jesus

and Christ.7 Jesus is the name of a little human body in which the vast

Christ Consciousness was born. Although the Christ Consciousness

manifested in the body of Jesus, it cannot be limited to one human form. It

would be a metaphysical error to say that the omnipresent Christ

Consciousness is circumscribed by the body of any one human being.

Jadava Krishna is the Christ of the Hindus. These two great avatars, Jadava

and Jesus, fully manifested the Christ Consciousness, the Kutastha

Chaitanya or divine guiding Intelligence that is in every atom of creation.

“But as many as received him (the universal Christ Consciousness), to them

gave he power to become the sons of God.”8

Jesus said: “Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall

not fall on the ground without [the sight of] your Father.”9 God’s

consciousness is everywhere. He knows simultaneously everything that is

going on in the world. You are aware of whatever is happening in any part

of your body, and in the same way God feels everything that is going on in

His body—the cosmos. When you can feel His omnipresent consciousness

in your fingertips, in your heart and head and wherever there is any

vibration of creation; when you can feel yourself in every speck of space;

when your sympathy and love have spread everywhere and you feel

oneness with everything, you are in Christ Consciousness. Both Jesus and

Jadava were one with the omnipresence of Christ Consciousness.

If you put some salt water in a bottle and cork it, and then place the bottle in

the ocean, the water in the bottle cannot mix with the water of the ocean.

Remove the cork and they become one, being composed of the same

ingredients. So when we remove the cork of ignorance from the bottle of

our consciousness, as did Jadava Krishna and Jesus Christ, we become one

with the vast Universal Consciousness.

From Christ and Krishna we learn that the purpose of religion is to expand

human consciousness and unite it with the omnipresent Christ

Consciousness. How? The social way is by cultivating divine love for

everything that is. To love all impartially is to know Christ Consciousness.

The transcendental way is by direct communion with the Christ

Consciousness through yoga meditation.

The body continuously reminds you that you are flesh. Yet every night in

sleep God banishes your consciousness of the flesh to show you that you

are not the body. You are not the wave, but the Ocean behind the wave. You

are not this mortal consciousness, but the Immortal Consciousness behind

it.

Jesus declared: “I and my Father are one.”10 He who knows God becomes

one with God. The consciousness of such a devotee is not only in the body;

he feels oneness with the Spirit behind his body and mind. When the wave

dances on the sea it thinks it exists as a separate entity. But once it realizes,

“I cannot exist without the ocean,” the wave sees that it is the ocean, that

the ocean has created a little wave out of itself. Similarly, God can manifest

Himself as a soul within the form of man, but He cannot be limited by that

form. The Bhagavad Gita says: “The Supreme Spirit, transcendent and

existing in the body, is the detached Beholder, the Consenter, the Sustainer,

the Experiencer, the Great Lord, and also the Highest Self.”11 Jesus

understood that “The Father has become myself.” This truth is also brought

out in the Hindu scriptures: “Tat twam asi,” “That thou art.”

Concepts of God and Trinity Agree

Hinduism as well as Christianity believes in one God. A few

misunderstanding Westerners who have visited India have brought back

stories that prejudice others against Hindu religious practices. I could

similarly go back to India and say that I found America to be a place of

murderers, racketeers, and drunkards; but I realize that such persons do not

constitute the whole of America. There are defects in India as there are

defects in America and everywhere else. Some Indian teachers instruct their

followers to concentrate on an image representing a particular aspect of the

Infinite Spirit. The visible image helps devotees to increase their

concentration and devotion in prayer to the unseen Spirit. Uninformed

Westerners conclude that Indians as a whole worship idols. But we worship

only Brahman, Spirit. The concept of one God is the same in Hinduism as

in Christianity.

The concept of the Trinity is also exactly the same in the Hindu and

Christian scriptures. The Trinity is not a negation of the one God; it

illustrates a metaphysical truth, that the One became Three when God made

this creation.

In the beginning—when there was no creation—there was Spirit. But Spirit

wanted to create, and by His wishful thought He projected a great sphere of

light, or cosmic energy, which became the universe. That cosmic energy is

the Holy Ghost. “Ghost” means something invisible and intelligent. “Holy

Ghost” refers to the spiritual vibration or energy of creation in which the

intelligence of God is immanent as Christ Consciousness, “the only

begotten Son,”12 God’s pure reflection in creation. This Christ Intelligence

holds the universe in balance. God the Father is the Intelligence beyond

creation; the Son or Christ Consciousness is His Intelligence in creation;

and the Holy Ghost is the intelligent vibration of creation itself. Long

before Christ spoke of it, the Trinity was described in the Hindu scriptures:

“Aum, Tat, Sat”—Cosmic Vibration, Christ Intelligence, and God the

Father.

The Bible tells us of Jesus Christ’s promise that when he was gone from

this world he would send the Comforter,13 the Holy Ghost. Every vibration

emanates a sound. The Holy Ghost is the Cosmic Intelligent Vibration,

whose sound is the Aum or Amen heard in deep yoga meditation. Saint

John spoke of it when he said: “I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and

heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet.”14 That sound is the Holy

Ghost. In its vibration is our comfort.

We are living in a new age in which God’s voice of cosmic vibration, of

Aum and Amen, can be heard from the two ends of the two hemispheres in

the scriptures of Krishna and Christ. It was in the land of India that Krishna

spoke of the Aum sound 15 and it was another Oriental Christ who spoke of

this same vibration, calling it Amen or Holy Ghost, as the means of

communing with God.

By attuning your consciousness within in meditation, you can hear and

commune with the Aum or Amen vibration in which you meet the great

Comforter. In communion with the holy Comforter you realize the

immanent Christ Consciousness. In deeper communion with the Christ

Consciousness you realize you are one with God. As soon as you know the

Holy Ghost you know Christ Consciousness, and when you know Christ

Consciousness you know that you and your Father, Cosmic Consciousness,

are one. The divine Christ Consciousness hidden in every atom of creation

is the same as the Cosmic Consciousness of the Father beyond creation.

First you must know how to commune with the Trinity. Through such

communion, you become one with Spirit; then there is no longer a Trinity:

Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are seen to be the one Spirit.

The Pitfalls of Body Consciousness

Consider the limitations of this physical body. Looking outward you see

disease, suffering, pain, and heartaches; but on the other, inner side of this

body, in the subtle centers of spiritual consciousness, is the Comforter.

When your mind follows the stream of ordinary outward consciousness you

will know Hades; but when by meditating on Aum your mind follows the

stream of the inner consciousness, you will find the great Heaven that exists

behind this body. That is why Jesus said, “Take no thought for your life,

what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye

shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body more than

raiment?”16 As soon as you become concentrated on the limited physical

body you will fall into the pit of misery. It is popular in these times to seek

prosperity, but you may become ill and unable to enjoy your abundance.

Therefore Jesus warned that we should seek the kingdom of God first. Your

consciousness must be with God. This is man’s highest duty. “For all these

things do the nations of the world seek after; and your Father knoweth that

ye have need of these things. But rather seek ye the kingdom of God; and

all these things shall be added unto you.”17 Health or no health, power or

no power, seek God first. When you seek with that determination, “all

things shall be added unto you”—not before.

Christ went even further: “There is no man that hath left house, or brethren,

or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my sake,

and the gospel’s, but he shall receive an hundredfold now in this time,

houses, and brethren, and sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with

persecutions; and in the world to come eternal life.”18 In these words Christ

teaches physical renunciation as the highest way of attaining God. Isn’t it

foolish not to renounce a few material things in order to realize the kingdom

of heaven? But seldom do even devout Christians follow what Christ said

here; not many are able to follow this path. Yet renunciation is not self-

punishment; it is the investment of a few temporal trinkets in order to gain

the eternal treasure—God. Worldly persons have left God for perishable

acquisitions, but I have left perishable things for God.

The Gita also advises renunciation. Krishna says: “Forsaking all other

dharmas (duties), remember Me alone; I will free thee from all sins

(accruing from nonperformance of those lesser duties).”19 The shame and

trouble and misery that will arise from forsaking worldly duties God will

forgive you. But the Gita says more: “The sages call that man wise whose

pursuits are all without selfish plan or longings for results, and whose

activities are purified (cauterized of karmic outgrowths) by the fire of

wisdom. Relinquishing attachment to the fruits of work, always contented,

independent (of material rewards), the wise do not perform any (binding)

action even in the midst of activities.”20 Therein Krishna declares that it is

not necessary to forsake all things outwardly to find God, if everything you

do is without selfish motive, and done only to please Him. To forget God

for worldly duties is to show colossal ingratitude, for we cannot do our duty

to our family and others without the power borrowed from Him.

In India hundreds go away into the forest just to think of God alone. That is

the way that Christ taught when he called to his disciples, “Follow me.”21

They left their work and their homes and forsook all, even their lives, for

God.

Significance of Krishna’s Life for Modern Man

Lord Krishna says in the Gita that what man really needs to do to find the

kingdom of heaven is to renounce the fruits of action. God has sent man

into this life so circumstanced with hunger and desires that he must work.

Without work human civilization would be a jungle of disease, famine, and

confusion. If all the people in the world were to leave their material

civilizations and live in the forests, the forests would then have to be

transformed into cities, else the inhabitants would die because of lack of

sanitation. On the other hand, material civilization is full of imperfections

and misery. What possible remedy can be advocated?

Krishna’s life demonstrates his philosophy that it is not necessary to flee the

responsibilities of material life. The problem can be solved by bringing God

here where He has placed us. No matter what our environment may be, into

the mind where God-communion reigns, Heaven must come.

“A heaven without Thee, O God, I want not! I love to work in the factory if

I can but hear Thy voice in the noisy wheels of the machinery. A material

life without Thee, my Lord, is a source of physical misery, disease, crime,

ignorance, and unhappiness.”22

To avoid the pitfalls of the two extremes, renunciation of the world, or

drowning in material life, man should so train his mind by constant

meditation that he can perform the necessary dutiful actions of his daily life

and still maintain the consciousness of God within. All men and women

should remember that their worldly life can be freed from endless physical

and mental ills if they add deep meditation to their daily routine of living. A

balanced life of meditation and activity, without attachment to the fruits of

action, is the example set by Krishna’s life.

The message of Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita stands as the doctrine best

suited to our modern busy life of many worries. To work without the peace

of God is hades. To work with God’s happiness ever bubbling in the soul is

to carry a portable paradise within you wherever you go. To be constantly

worried even in pleasant surroundings is to live in hades; to live in the

inner, boundless soul-peace, even though housed in a rickety shack, is real

paradise. Whether in a palace or under a tree, we must carry with us always

this inner heaven.

The yogi enjoys everything with the consciousness of God. But at the same

time he can say: “If I don’t see the face of food, I shall never miss it.” The

conditions of the world should not bother you. Be not attached to anything.

Jesus fasted for forty days and kept his mind always on God.

If you are in the world and have no attachment to it, you are a real yogi. To

remain in the candy store and not touch the candy is true renunciation.

However, milk will not float on water unless you make butter of it. The

only way to find happiness and emancipation is to seek God and live by His

laws. Jesus said: “If thy hand offend thee, cut it off.”23 That kind of

determination is needed. You must realize in your heart and soul this truth:

“Lord, You alone are mine. I am here just to please You.”

Renounce not only outwardly but mentally too. Jesus did not mean that man

should not eat or put on clothes; he himself ate food and wore clothing. He

did mean that one should be mentally nonattached to dress and food. He

was teaching that renunciation must be accomplished mentally as well as

externally. “Take no thought...for your body”24 means “Don’t worry too

much about food and clothing and the demands of the body.” It is more

important to be clean inside than outside. If you can be pure within and also

clean without, that is even better.

Moral Doctrines Universal in the Scriptures

We find the main moral doctrines of religion in both the Bible and the

Hindu scriptures. The message of the Gita includes the precepts of the Ten

Commandments of Christianity, and also the reason why it is wrong to

break them. The Gita wisely warns: “He who ignores the scriptural

commands and who follows his own foolish desires does not find happiness

or perfection or the Infinite Goal.”25 You can be moral without being

religious, but the principles of morality are a necessary beginning in the

practice of religion; for true religion is deeper than morality—it is contact

with God. You should not concentrate on your faults, nor think of yourself

as a sinner. Affirm that you are a child of God, and dwell on what Jesus

said: “I and my Father are one.”

Reincarnation in the Gita and the Bible

Reincarnation, so beautifully expounded by Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita,

is one of the most helpful and inspiring spiritual doctrines; without it we

cannot understand the justice of God. Why would a baby be born crippled?

Why would God send to a family two babies who are strong and whole, and

one who is lame? If we are all made in God’s image, where is the justice of

this? Only reincarnation can explain it. The crippled baby is a soul that in

some past life transgressed God’s laws and, as a result, lost the use of his

legs. As it is the mind that molds the body, and this soul had lost the

consciousness of having healthy legs, it was unable to create a perfect pair

of limbs when it came back again in this life. And so we must come, and

come again, until we regain our lost perfection. He who becomes perfect

shall not have to return to earth anymore.

Those who have overcome desire shall be one with God. Jesus spoke of this

when he said: “Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of

my God, and he shall go no more out.”26 The Gita similarly promises: “O

Arjuna! this is the ‘established in Brahman’ state. Anyone entering this

state is never (again) deluded. Even at the very moment of transition (from

the physical to the astral), if one becomes anchored therein, he attains the

final, irrevocable, state of Spirit-communion.”27 When you overcome

physical desires, you shall go no more out of God. Desire brings you back

to this earth. We have been prodigal children, and unless we forsake desires

we cannot go back to God. If suddenly we have to leave this earth with

desires still in our hearts, we must come here again until we work them out.

It is necessary to regain self-perfection before we can return to God. When

the storm is on, the wave rises out of the ocean, but as soon as the ocean is

calm again, the wave can sink back into the sea. So it is with us. As soon as

this storm of material desires is over we can melt again into the ocean of

God.

Early Christianity taught reincarnation. Jesus had revealed his knowledge of

this truth when he said: “Elias is come already, and they knew him

not....Then the disciples understood that he spake unto them of John the

Baptist.”28 When he said, “Elias is come already,” he meant that the soul of

Elias had reincarnated in the body of John the Baptist.

Christ Born an Oriental to Unite East and West

God made Jesus Christ an Oriental in order to bring East and West together.

Christ came to awaken the divine consciousness of brotherhood in the East

and West. It is true also that Christ lived in India during the eighteen

unaccounted-for years of his life, studying with India’s great masters. That

doesn’t take away from his divinity and uniqueness; it shows the unity and

brotherhood of all great saints and avatars.

The great ones come on earth to show that the Christ Consciousness they

have attained is what all who live here must seek. You must expand your

consciousness and banish your suffering. Eating food doesn’t make physical

pain go away. Acquiring possessions doesn’t stop mental suffering. Reading

spiritual books doesn’t satisfy the soul. The masters of India say that the

purpose of religion is not to create certain doctrines to be followed blindly,

but to show mankind the perennial method of finding everlasting happiness.

As the businessman tries to alleviate the suffering of others by supplying

some need; as every man is an agent of God for doing some good on earth,

so Christ, Krishna, Buddha—all the great ones—came on earth to bestow

on mankind the highest good: knowledge of the path to Eternal Bliss, and

the example of their sublime lives to inspire us to follow it.

Someday you will have to leave the body. No matter how powerful you are,

the body will eventually have to be buried beneath the sod. There is no time

to be wasted. The Yoga methods taught by my beloved Christ and my

beloved Krishna do destroy ignorance and suffering, by enabling man to

attain his own Self-realization and union with God. In the name of the

Originator of Christians and Hindus, let us break down the walls of

suffering and ignorance, and worship God truly. Too often in His name the

demons of avarice and prejudice have danced in God’s temples. We must

restore to His altars the Lord of peace and joy. Let us behave on earth not as

Americans or Indians with conflicting customs and beliefs, but as children

of one Father. “Christian” and “Hindu” are only names. Let us live as a

great divine family in a United World of Oneness, knowing within and

without the harmony and bliss of Spirit.

* * *

A Vision of Christ and Krishna

An experience recounted by

Paramahansa Yogananda in Whispers from Eternity

I beheld a great blue valley encircled by mountains that shimmered jewel-
like. Around opalescent peaks vagrant mists sparkled. A river of silence
flowed by, diamond-bright. And there I saw, coming out of the depths of the
mountains, Jesus and Krishna walking hand in hand: the Christ who prayed
by the river Jordan and the Christna who played a flute by the river
Yamuna.
They baptized me in the radiant waters; my soul melted in fathomless
depths. Everything began to emit astral flames. My body and the forms of
Christ and Krishna, the iridescent hills, the glowing stream, and the far
empyrean became dancing lights, while atoms of fire flew. Finally nothing
remained but mellow luminosity, in which all creation trembled.
O Spirit! in my heart I bow again and again to Thee: Eternal Light in Whom
all forms commingle.
1 One of the several names of Krishna. (See Bhagavan Krishna in glossary.)
2 This Sanskrit word means “descent”; its roots are ava, “down,” and tri,
“to pass.” In the Hindu scriptures, avatara signifies the descent of Divinity
into flesh.
3 John 14:12.
4 Luke 23:34.
5 Satan and Kaliya represent evil, or ignorance of God.
6 Mahavatar Babaji had requested my guru, Swami Sri Yukteswar, to write
a book showing that there is no real discrepancy between the scriptures of
East and West. That book is The Holy Science.
7 See “Jesus: A Christ of East and West.”
8 John 1:12.
9 Matthew 10:29.

10 John 10:30.
11 XIII:22.
12 John 1:18.
13 John 14:26.
14 Revelation 1:10.
15 The author here refers to a verse in the Bhagavad Gita wherein the Lord
in the form of Krishna says: “I am the Aum (Pranava) in all the Vedas; the
sound in the ether...” (VII:8). In his Autobiography, Paramahansaji has
explained that the wisdom of the Vedas, India’s most ancient scriptures, was
divinely revealed from age to age to the rishis, “seers”; and that it was a
revelation by sound, “directly heard” (shruti). Having by deepest meditation
attuned their consciousness to the cosmic vibration of Aum, the rishis heard
within the timeless truths about Spirit and creation. (Publisher’s Note)
16 Matthew 6:25.
17 Luke 12:30–31.
18 Mark 10:29–30.
19 XVIII:66.
20 IV:18–20.
21 Matthew 4:19.
22 Whispers from Eternity.
23 Mark 9:43.
24 Matthew 6:25.
25 XVI:23.

26 Revelation 3:12.

27 II:72.

28 Matthew 17:12–13.

The Ten Commandments: Eternal Rules of

Happiness

First Self-Realization Fellowship Temple at Encinitas, California, March 6,

1938

The sudden cataclysms that occur in nature, creating havoc and mass injury,

are not “acts of God.” Such disasters result from the thoughts and actions of

man. Whenever the world’s vibratory balance of good and evil is disturbed

by an accumulation of harmful vibrations, the result of man’s wrong

thinking and wrong doing, you will see devastation such as we have

recently experienced.1

The world will continue to have warfare and natural calamities until all

people correct their wrong thoughts and behavior. Wars are brought about

not by fateful divine action but by widespread material selfishness. Banish

selfishness—individual, industrial, political, national—and you will have

no more wars.

When materiality predominates in man’s consciousness, there is an

emission of subtle negative rays; their cumulative power disturbs the

electrical balance of nature, and that is when earthquakes, floods, and other

disasters happen. God is not responsible for them! Man’s thoughts have to

be controlled before nature can be controlled.2

Rama, an avatar who was one of India’s great Hindu emperors, reigned over

the kingdom of Ayodhya, whose inhabitants all lived righteously. It is said

that during the golden era of Rama’s rule no accidents or premature deaths

or natural disasters disturbed Ayodhya’s perfect harmony. There will be

more harmony and health in every home as the individual members of the

family live more rightly. When family members selfishly take away from

one another, the house naturally will be filled with disharmony. So also with

the nations; only when mankind lives rightly will the kingdom of God come

on earth. But time is short. You are here today, and tomorrow you are gone.

As a human being, it is your highest privilege to seek God. You should use

the freedom He has given you in this life to prove by experiment the eternal

spiritual truths.

Sin is that which causes you suffering. Virtue is that which makes you

lastingly happy. If there is no spiritual harmony in your mind, even a new

house and a new car cannot make you happy; you will have your hades with

you just the same.

Real happiness can stand the challenge of all outer experiences. When you

can bear the crucifixions of others’ wrongs against you and still return love

and forgiveness; and when you can keep that divine inner peace intact

despite all painful thrusts of outer circumstance, then you shall know this

happiness.

“He who ignores the scriptural commands and who follows his own foolish

desires does not find happiness or perfection or the Infinite Goal. Therefore,

take the scriptures as your guide in determining what should be done and

what should be avoided. With intuitive understanding of the injunctions

declared in holy writ, be pleased to perform thy duties here.”3 Those who

are inwardly content are living rightly. Happiness comes only by doing

right. Be happy here and you will also be happy in the beyond. Death is not

an escape. You must be good now if you want heaven in the future.

According to the law of cause and effect, you are after death exactly what

you were before. So “make hay” by gathering wisdom while the sun of

opportunity shines.

The Ten Eternal Rules of Happiness

The Ten Commandments4 might have been more aptly named the Ten

Eternal Rules of Happiness. The word “commandment” is an unfortunate

choice, because few persons like to be commanded. As soon as you tell a

child not to do a thing, he at once wants to do it.

These Ten Commandments are being broken every day, everywhere. Unless

their spiritual meaning is understood, people will always rebel against them.

The Ten Commandments are eternal rules of conduct that have been set

forth in all the great world religions. However, the scriptures for the most

part do not explain the psychology and utility of these commandments.

People accept them in church but do not act upon them outside of church,

rationalizing that these precepts are impractical. Yet the breaking of the Ten

Commandments is the primary source of all the misery in the world.

What is the utility of the commandments? In the Bhagavad Gita we are told

to forsake all else and remember God alone. “Absorb thy mind in Me,

become My devotee; resign all things to Me; bow down to Me. Thou art

dear to Me, so in truth do I promise thee: thou shalt attain Me.”5 This

corresponds to the first of the Ten Commandments given to Moses:

“Thou shalt have no other gods before me.” God-realization should be the

goal of living. Material duties cannot be performed without power

borrowed from God. To perform one’s ordinary duties, and forget Him, is

the highest sin. Sin means ignorance, acting against one’s highest good.

How many times have you felt a burning sorrow in your heart? Why?

Because you didn’t act rightly; because God was not first in your heart. The

Gita says: “Forsaking all other dharmas (duties), remember Me alone; I will

free thee from all sins (accruing from nonperformance of those lesser

duties).”6 There should be no other god in your life who means more to you

than God. Even though Jesus was one with the Father, he said: “I do not

know all the things that my Father knows.”7

As soon as man begins to worship possessions, name, fame—anything less

than God—he finds unhappiness. “Those who worship lesser gods, O

Arjuna, they go unto them; My devotee comes unto Me.”8 Only God can

fulfill man’s dreams of lasting happiness. No diversion should be allowed to

replace worship of the Supreme Lord. If you study the Hindu scriptures you

will see how they correspond with the Ten Commandments of the Bible.

“Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image.” Symbol worship is all

right for a few, but it has more bad than good results. To worship the cross

of Christ and forget what the cross stands for is to worship a “graven

image,” because you have lost sight of its significance. When a great

spiritual teacher passes on, his image, or some symbol of his life, is usually

kept and venerated, and this is all right provided you remember and emulate

his qualities. But if you worship an image without conscious regard for

what it represents, then you have forgotten the Infinite. To have a picture or

a statue of Jesus is acceptable if it helps you to dwell on his divine qualities.

Then you are not worshiping a graven image, but the ideal the image

represents to you. Whatever worship ritual you perform with the

consciousness of Spirit is pleasing to the Lord. But in Moses’ time many

worshipers had forgotten God; they were venerating mere objects, even

sacrificing goats to them.

In India it is customary to make a picture or statue of a saint, or perhaps to

fashion an image symbolic of a specific manifestation or quality of the

Divine, and place it in a temple. The people offer flowers to God or to the

spirit of the saint represented by the picture or statue, and meditate on the

divine qualities it symbolizes. Such worship is acceptable in God’s eyes.9

True devotees do not allow their consciousness to dwell on the object, but

concentrate with deepest love and attention on the Spirit behind it. A great

saint of India used to go into samadhi (ecstatic communion with God)

whenever he offered his devotion before the image of the Divine Mother in

the temple where he worshiped. “I was placing flowers at the feet of a stone

symbol,” he said, “when suddenly I beheld that, untouched by my body, I

was one with the Sustainer of the universe. I began placing flowers on my

own head.”

If you can do so, it is much better to concentrate inwardly on God than to

focus your attention first on an external intermediary symbol, and then

transfer that concentration to the Spirit. God is infinite. How could an

image encase Him? This is the reason behind the second commandment.

We should not worship an image as God, because He is infinite.

Being infinite, God cannot be limited to any form, human or stone; yet He

is manifest in all forms. One can rightly say that God manifests in every

man as well as in great saints, for He is present in all. The sun shines

equally, also, on a piece of charcoal and a diamond. But the diamond

receives and reflects the sun’s light, whereas the charcoal does not.

Similarly, all people are exposed to the light of God, but not all receive and

reflect that light. To do so they must purify themselves by meditation and

by following the Ten Commandments.

“Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.” When you say

the name of God, you must be inwardly aware of what you are saying. Were

it possible to look into others’ minds when they are praying, you would see

that a great many are thinking about almost anything but the Lord. They are

taking the name of God in vain. When we pray we should try our utmost to

concentrate our whole attention on God, instead of saying “God, God, God”

and letting our minds dwell on something else. An aunt of mine had the

habit of saying her prayers on beads. She could almost always be seen

busily fingering her beads. But she approached me one day and confessed

that although she had been doing this for forty years, God had never

answered her prayers. No wonder! Her “prayers” were hardly more than a

nervous physical habit.

Don’t think of anything but the Spirit when you are praying. Try your

utmost to be sincere. The use of beads in prayer, and japa, repetition of the

name of God, are good when practiced with devotion and concentration.

But these all too often become mechanical; they are lower forms of

worship. But to whisper “God” in your heart on beads of love—that is true

worship. It is insulting to God also if you sing hymns or chant to Him with

an absent mind. The Bhagavad Gita similarly stresses the importance of a

concentrated mind while worshiping God. When you pray, your heart and

your mind should be filled with the love of God. “He attains the Supreme

Effulgent Lord, O Arjuna! whose mind, stabilized by Yoga, is immovably

fixed on the thought of Him.”10

“Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.” Out of a week of seven days,

how few people devote even one to God! To keep apart one day for Him is

in the best interests of your own welfare. Sunday is the sun’s day—the

bright day of wisdom. Many never use it to think of God, though to do so is

the highest wisdom. If on that day, you could just be alone and quiet for a

little time, enjoying that stillness, you would see how much better you feel.

Observe the sabbath in this way; it will be a salve to the lacerations of the

preceding six days. Everyone needs one day a week in the spiritual hospital

to heal his mental wounds.

Don’t observe the sabbath as a forced duty; enjoy it. When it becomes for

you a day of peace and joy and contentment, you will look forward to it.

Seclusion is the price of greatness. You may be surprised at what seclusion

with God will do for your mind, body, and soul. In the early morning, and

before retiring, you should immerse yourself in His peace.

India’s sages counsel not only a regular day for seclusion, but stress the

need for quiet meditation during four specific periods every day. In the

early morning, before you get up or see anyone, remain calm, feeling peace.

At noon, be quiet for a while before taking lunch; and before your evening

meal, have another time for peace. Before going to bed, go into that silence

again. Those who faithfully observe silence in seclusion during these four

times of the day cannot but feel in tune with God. Whoever cannot manage

four times a day should observe each morning and evening a period devoted

to God. By doing this you will have a different, happier life.

If you continually write out checks without depositing anything in your

bank account, you will run out of money. So it is with your life. Without

regular deposits of peace in your life account, you will run out of strength,

calmness, and happiness. You will finally become bankrupt—emotionally,

mentally, physically, and spiritually. But daily communion with God will

continually replenish your inner bankroll.

Four times a day sit quietly in meditation and think with all the love and

longing of your heart: “I am with the Infinite now. ‘Father, reveal Thyself,

reveal Thyself.’” Strive to feel the peace of His presence. Bathe your mind

and body in that peace, and you will be much more successful in life. The

calm man doesn’t make mistakes. When thousands of others are failing, he

succeeds. You must be calm to be successful. Those who do not observe the

sabbath by feeling this divine peace develop great moodiness. They become

nervous automatons. Through the portals of silence the healing sun of

wisdom and peace will shine upon you.

The sabbath should be a day of rest and cultivation of divine peace.

However, activity that expresses wisdom and peace is also appropriate on

the sabbath.

“Honor thy father and thy mother.” The human father and mother should be

honored as the representatives of God, the supreme Parent, who has

empowered them with His gift to create man. The mother is God’s

unconditional love incarnate, because a true mother forgives when no one

else does. The father is a manifestation of the Heavenly Father’s wisdom

and protection of His children. One should not love father and mother apart

from God, but as representations of His protecting love and wisdom. The

Supreme Spirit becomes the father and mother to help each child. Therefore

honor Him in your parents.

“Thou shalt not kill.” The meaning is that one should not kill for killing’s

sake; for then you become a murderer. One should not take another’s life in

a moment of violent emotion. But if your country is attacked and goes to

war, you should fight to protect those whom God has given to you. You

have a righteous obligation to defend your family and your country.

“Thou shalt not commit adultery.” The ideal of sexual union should be the

creation of children made in the image of God, and the expression of the

pure love of the soul that is felt between marriage partners who behold only

God in each other. Those who live solely on the physical plane, never

thinking of love or the high purpose for which the sex sense was intended,

are, in the spirit of this commandment, committing adultery. One is then no

better than the animal, who has his sex and goes his way.

Except for the purpose of procreation, and the expression of mutual true

love in the holy state of matrimony, the creative urge is intended by God to

be transmuted into energy and divine realization. Insofar as you can absorb

the sexual power, you can develop great mental powers to write, paint, or

express yourself creatively in a thousand other ways. As you ultimately

control and spiritualize the creative energy, you will feel great peace and

love and bliss in God. Saints who have thus spiritualized the sexual energy

are very powerful, able to demonstrate wonderful achievements in the

world and in the interior search for Truth.

Thus the highest use of sex is the sublimation of its power in order to

manifest spiritual thoughts and ideals and wisdom. It is detrimental to your

mental and physical well-being if you concentrate on sex apart from the

expression of marital love or the procreative purpose of married life. One

should not dwell on sex thoughts or act promiscuously on sex thoughts.

When you can exercise this restraint you can develop the right attitude

toward sex and its wholesome divine purpose.

The universe and man were immaculately created by God’s will. In the

beginning, man also was empowered to create immaculately by will, as God

did. Man lost this power when he was tempted to concentrate on sexual

rather than spiritual expression of the divine creative power. To be enslaved

by sex is to lose health, self-control, and peace of mind—everything that

man needs to be happy.

“Thou shalt not steal.” If all the people in a community of 1,000 steal from

one another, each will have 999 enemies. Therefore one should not unfairly

take from others their property or love or peace or any other possession. If

you feel no desire to take what does not belong to you, that which you need

or wish for will come to you. Stealing begins in the mind, when you begin

to covet what others have. The seeds of desire must be removed from the

mind. Spiritual unselfishness is the way; then one automatically attracts

abundance.

Unless material selfishness is abandoned, there can be no happiness in the

world. Happiness will come only by spiritual cooperation, when all men

begin to feel for others’ necessities as for their own, and to work for others

as earnestly as for self.

“Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.” To harm anyone

through distortion of truth is another way of disrupting social happiness. If

you want to be treated well, you should treat others well. It is important to

speak the truth at all times.

To be always truthful one must understand the difference between fact and

truth. Your truthfully pointing out that a man is lame only hurts; it does no

good. Therefore one should not speak unpleasant facts unnecessarily. To tell

a truth that would betray another person, and to no worthy purpose, is also

wrong. One should not speak untruth to avoid speaking truth, but rather

remain silent. Never carelessly or maliciously reveal information that could

embarrass and hurt others.

“Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s house, thou shalt not covet thy

neighbor’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his

ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbor’s.” Covetousness is the source of

discontent. Learn to differentiate between “necessary necessities” and

“unnecessary necessities.” The more you covet what others have, the more

unhappy you will be. You will spend your life in misery and never find

contentment. Seek spiritual riches within.

What you are is much greater than anything or anyone else you have ever
yearned for. God is manifest in you in a way that He is not manifest in any
other human being. Your face is unlike anyone else’s, your soul is unlike
anyone else’s, you are sufficient unto yourself; for within your soul lies the
greatest treasure of all—God.
1 A reference to local floods after unusually heavy rains.
2 “Man’s vaunted ‘conquest of nature’ is the expression of a power
complex—vain humbug. Nature is that which we obey. The scientist is
deciphering the rules we have to obey. Every rule disclosed has had within
it its own power to ensure obedience.”—G. Scott Williamson and Innes H.
Pearse, Biologists in Search of Material (Faber & Faber, London, 1950).
3 Bhagavad Gita XVI:23–24.
4 Exodus 20:3–17.
5 XVIII:65.
6 XVIII:66.
7 “But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no not the angels which are in
heaven, neither the Son, but the Father” (Mark 13:32).
8 Bhagavad Gita VII:23.
9 “Whatever embodiment (a God-incarnate, a saint, or a deity) a devotee
strives faithfully to worship, it is I who make his devotion unflinching.
Absorbed in that devotion, intent on the worship of that embodiment, the
devotee thus gains the fruits of his longings. Yet those fulfillments are
verily granted by Me alone” (Bhagavad Gita VII:21–22).
10 VIII:8.

How to Read Character

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, January 11, 1942

By studying the character of others, one can become alert to ways in which

he can improve his own nature. To study character in a negative way,

however, is not right, and has a devastating effect. Everyone shuns a

“character detective,” who exposes others’ faults. Many people who enjoy

criticizing cannot themselves stand criticism, and may even have the same

flaws they so righteously deplore in another.

Character study is important primarily in this respect: one needs constantly

to take note of virtues in others and to implant those good traits in himself. I

study character when I choose people with whom to work. But I have an

entirely different standpoint for choosing. Sometimes I let a person that I

know is “bad” be with me, in the hope that he will change. If he responds to

my spiritual thought for his welfare he becomes better; and if he doesn’t,

well, I take that chance. I am like a medical doctor who risks exposure to a

disease in order to help a patient. All doctors have to take that chance

because their desire is to serve. So it is with a spiritual doctor; he

undertakes to judge others and show them their defects in order to help

them improve.

Jesus said: “Judge not, that ye be not judged.”1 He condemned that

criticism of others which is done solely out of desire to hurt. Such behavior

is unkind and spoils friendship. Criticism has no use whatsoever unless it is

given with sincere love, and only when wanted. It should be offered with a

loving desire to help the other person. Those who have learned self-control

have the right to help others. From that point of view character study is

worthwhile.

Physical Appearance an Index of Character

One type of character study is based on physiognomy. It is said that the

salient characteristics of man are revealed in his body—a very sweeping

statement. Not all one’s physiological characteristics do tell the real tale of

the inner life.

Aristotle studied physiognomy as a guide to character. Hindu teachers go

deeper. They say that the main thoughts of all one’s incarnations are

reflected in the eyes. Though the eyes reveal the whole story of the soul, not

only of this life but of past lives, still it requires a master’s mind to analyze

the revelation of your past lives reflected in this life.

Once in a while you are walking along and suddenly notice something in

the eyes of a passerby, and you think, “I don’t like him,” or as the case may

be, “I like him.” Eyes tell the whole story. Fear, anger, jealousy, greed,

generosity, love, courage, spirituality—all these qualities, good and bad,

cause corresponding reflections in the eyes. Detectives can control their

facial muscles so as not to betray by their expressions what they are

thinking, but they cannot hide the suspicion in their eyes. A yogi has calm

eyes because he is thinking of the tranquil Spirit.

Facial and bodily features have been studied, even the bumps on the head

have been analyzed; but physical appearance does not always tell the story,

and different cultures draw different conclusions from their observations.

Some say that fat people are luxury-loving and don’t like to work, and that

thin people are more spiritual. Yet in India, fatness in a spiritual person is

viewed favorably. Caesar was wary of Cassius’ “lean and hungry”

appearance, in which he saw a threat to his power. Some writers have

theorized that those who are thin think too much, hence flesh doesn’t build

up on them. A study of history shows that both lean and stout people have

been good rulers.

If you are persistently fat now, you were fat many times before; or if in this

life you are chronically thin, you have been thin for several incarnations.

You have inherited the tendency from the past; and no matter what you eat,

that thought-pattern tends to manifest itself.

Physiognomy as a revealer of character is true if one takes into account the

fact that all the thoughts that have passed through a particular mind during

many incarnations show in the body. But it takes the intuitive power of a

master to “read” one’s physiognomy completely and correctly.

For example, Socrates was very ugly. He met a great astrologer who said,

“Socrates, you are the most evil and wicked person I know.” Socrates’

students were very angry at the astrologer, but their teacher replied: “You

are right. I have been all that in the past. But though I have overcome it by

wisdom now, still the things I did then are registered in this body, making it

appear ugly.”

No two faces are the same. Each is different because of characteristics that

have manifested themselves in this life and in past lives. So it is not a

matter of simply judging people as bad or good because their present looks

are repellent or pleasing. St. Francis was not physically attractive, whereas

his disciple Brother Masseus was a handsome man. But Masseus did not

possess as great a spiritual beauty as St. Francis.

Emotions as a Clue to Character

There is another branch of investigation related to physiognomy; that of

pathognomy, the study of man’s feelings and emotions through the outward

signs of his facial expressions and bodily movements, and through study of

his emotional reactions to various incidents in his life. Feelings and habits

indicate one’s characteristics; but some people have cultivated the ability to

hide their true feelings because they don’t want to expose themselves to

others. Two husbands heard the news that their wives had drowned. One

was showing great grief and the other was not saying anything; but the one

who showed sorrow outwardly felt less love for his wife than did the

husband who didn’t reveal by his facial expression any pain at all. So

pathognomy, finding out the true feelings and reactions of people, is a very

deep study.

You can analyze people more surely according to their feelings than

according to their physical appearance. I combine the two methods for the

most accurate analysis. All those who come to me for training I place in

certain situations to see how their minds and feelings will react. If they

respond adversely I try to correct them; but I don’t do this unless the person

has asked to be corrected, and has given me the authority and permission to

guide him.

Some people are emotionally stirred at the slightest thing. Musicians in this

country are as a rule very emotional, and most of your music is emotional,

because it is written around the theme of human love. In India music

centers around the thought of God. That is why it tends to quiet the storms

of emotion and to bring out deep spiritual calmness. Not all Western

musicians are emotional, of course; nor are all Indian musicians spiritual,

though for the most part they are. The Sanskrit word for musician is

bhagavathar, “he who sings the praises of God.”

In dealing with emotional people you can seldom bank on their stability.

Today they are enthusiastic about you and tomorrow they leave you. I have

seen such persons come to the ashram, and within a few days they would

make me feel they were going to be as firmly loyal as the disciple John.

Next month I would find they had gone. If anything hurts me, it is when an

avowal of friendship is withdrawn by a breach of that trust. When I give my

friendship to anyone, I never take it back.

Evenmindedness, a Key to Development

One can easily tell the difference between the motor type and the thoughtful

type of man: the former always wants to work and the latter wants to think

things through. Both types are needed. Motor types like to act at once. They

should be taught to direct their energies into spiritually rewarding activities.

In order to help each type to create a harmonious balance, I advise motor

types to meditate and think more, and thoughtful types to meditate and

work more.

People addicted to bad habits—overeating, smoking, drinking—have to be

carefully handled. Any obstruction of desire causes anger. If you take food

way from a greedy man he will be wrathful. It is useless to try to help such

sense slaves until they themselves indicate a real desire to improve.

Swami Shankara said that evenminded people will know God. The Master

of the universe sits on the altar of evenmindedness. By evenmindedness

man enjoys the perfect equilibrium of peace.

One of the three basic qualities predominates in every man, according to

Hindu philosophy.2 Sattva is the quality of those who have spiritual

tendencies. They eat properly, cultivate good habits, and are devoted to the

Lord. The rajas quality is manifested in those who are active; such persons

keep busy with work until they die. Those in whom the tamas quality is

uppermost fill their lives with quarreling, anger, jealousy, sensuality, and

laziness.

Any habit that holds you from spiritual attainment should be overcome. You

must be the master of your thoughts and actions. It is better to be the active

rajasic type and to have your habits under control than to be the tamasic

type; but the sattvic type in whom goodness manifests itself is ideal. Those

who want to improve themselves should mix more with sattvic types.

Very few people know in what lies their own good. By this one criterion

you can judge anyone. Ninety-nine percent of all people fail under this test.

Tell a person, for his own good, to do a particular thing, and he will do

exactly the opposite. Why? Because he can’t help himself; his materialistic

habits are too strong. Very often people won’t do what you suggest, even

though they know it is good for them, just to prove that you can’t influence

them. Those who really want to improve should mix more with those who

are calm and self-controlled. Try to mix with people who are normal, and

better still, with people who are supernormal. The weak should seek out the

strong and the strong should seek out those who are even stronger. A

wrestler will never increase his strength unless he works out with a stronger

man.

Animal Characteristics in Man

After judging the mental qualities of sattva, rajas, and tamas in others, you

can analyze their physical behavior. Some say that women are “catty.” But

men can be just as catty. The cat eats the tame canary and then sits as

calmly as any yogi in order to feign innocence of his unwelcome act. Some

people enjoy being destructive to others’ peace and happiness. Their whole

purpose is to disturb and upset; like predatory wolves, they go about in

society and seek out fights.

Certain types of people have been compared to the jay—chattering all the

time. It is said that man was created first, and that the god Twashtri then

took the gentleness of the moon, the softness of the down from the swan’s

breast, the beauty of the flowers, and the chatter of the jay, and, combining

these things, made woman. And man was so happy. But after a while he

went to Twashtri and said, “She is a beautiful creature. I really appreciate

her. But she talks without rest and she has become the bane of my life. Take

her back.” Then after two months the man again visited Twashtri. “I am

very sad,” he said. “Please return the woman to me.” But after a while he

came again and said, “Please take her back.” This time Twashtri said, “No,

you have to keep her!” Poor man! he couldn’t live with her, but neither

could he live without her.

Women can complain, for their part, about men. Unless man and woman

understand each other’s nature, they ignorantly torture one another. Both

were created equal in God’s eyes; no man can come without woman, and no

woman can come without man. It is the duty of man and woman to attain

within themselves a balance between their respective predominating and

hidden qualities. Man is guided more by reason and woman more by

feeling. Each should strive for an inner balance of both reason and feeling,

and so become a “whole” personality, a perfected human being.

Some people behave like donkeys. No matter how much they have suffered

from the consequences of sense slavery, they stubbornly go on nourishing

their bad habits. They seem to have no memory whatsoever, quickly

forgetting the painful results of sense indulgence and so never learning from

their experiences.

In nature all the different animals represent different emotions and

characteristics; but man has them all in himself. He can act like the snake or

the wolf or the fox or the lion. Within us is the essence of hades and heaven.

We should learn to express more of the heavenly qualities.

Intuition Is the Surest Judge of Character

Though an interesting study of character is possible through analysis of the

eyes, the emotions, and the physical features, as has been pointed out, the

greatest and highest way to learn about character is through soul intuition. If

your mind and feeling remain perfectly calm, you will be able to feel

intuitively and exactly the nature of each person you meet.

My task is to take all kinds of people for training and help. It is not good to

set a limitation on any human being, confining his possibilities to a certain

analysis; but whether he changes or remains the same, intuition will be able

to tell you, more than your diagnosis of the eyes, feelings, or physical

features, whatever the nature of that person is. Intuition is the greatest

analytical power. As a mirror reflects all things held before it, so when your

mind-mirror is calm, you will be able to see reflected in it the true quality of

others. If you are busy doing good to all, remaining calm and meditative,

the true character of whoever comes to you will be revealed to you.

1 Matthew 7:1.

2 All creation is subject to the influence of three inherent gunas or qualities:

sattva, rajas, and tamas—spiritual or elevating, activating, and obstructing.

How to Be Happy at Will

Date and place unknown

As you watch the faces of human beings, you can usually classify their

expressions into four basic types, with corresponding mental states: smiling

faces, bespeaking inner and outer happiness; grim faces, denoting sadness;

dull, unsmiling faces, revealing inner boredom; and calm faces, reflecting

an inner peace.

A desire satisfied produces pleasure. A longing unfulfilled creates sadness.

Between the mental crests of happiness and sadness are troughs of

boredom. When the high waves of pleasure and pain and the depressions of

boredom become neutralized, the state of peace manifests.

Beyond the state there is an ever new state of bliss, which the individual can

find within himself and recognize as the true native state of his soul. This

bliss is buried beneath the exciting mental waves of exuberant pleasure and

deep depression and the hollows of indifference. When these waves

disappear from the mental waters, the placid state of peace is felt. Reflected

in the calm waters of peace is the ever new bliss.

Basis of Reactions

Most people in the world are tossing on the waves of exciting pleasure or

pain, and when these are wanting, they are bored. As you watch the faces of

others during the day—at home, in the office, on the streets, or at gatherings

—you can see that there are only a few who manifest peace.

When you see a merry countenance and ask that person, “What makes you

happy?” he is likely to answer in this way: “I had a raise in salary,” or, “I

met an interesting person.” Behind happiness lies the fulfillment of a desire.

When you see a doleful face and make sympathetic inquiry, its owner may

reply, “I’m a sick man,” or, “I lost my wallet.” His desire to regain health

(or his lost money) has been contradicted.

When you see a face registering a sort of blank neutrality, and you ask,

“What’s the matter? Are you unhappy about something?” he promptly

answers in the negative. But if you press him, “Are you happy?” he will

say, “Oh, no, I’m just bored.”

Negative and Positive Peace

You may meet a refined, well-to-do man living on an estate, looking healthy

and plump, and neither unduly happy nor sad or bored. In such case you

might say he is peaceful. But when that comfortably fixed person has too

much of this kind of peace—which few people have the good fortune to

experience—he thinks within, “I’ve had enough peace—I need some

excitement and diversion.” Or he may remark to a friend, “Please give me a

knock on the head to make me feel that I’m alive!”

The negative state of peace is derived from the absence of the three mental

states of happiness, sadness, and boredom. Without change or excitement,

protracted negative peace becomes stale and unenjoyable. But after long-

continued indulgence in the happy, sad, and bored states, negative peace is

enjoyable. For this reason, the yogis advocate the neutralization of the

waves of thoughts by concentration to achieve mental peace. Once the yogi

has stilled the waves of thought, he begins to look beneath the lake of

calmness, and finds there a positive state of peace—the ever new joy of the

soul.

I met a very wealthy man in New York. In the course of telling me

something about his life, he drawled, “I am disgustingly rich, and

disgustingly healthy—” and before he could finish I exclaimed, “But you

are not disgustingly happy! I can teach you how to be perpetually interested

in being ever newly happy.” He became my student. By practicing Kriya

Yoga, and by leading a balanced life, ever inwardly devoted to God, he

lived to a ripe old age, always bubbling with ever new happiness. On his

deathbed he told his wife, “I am sorry for you—that you have to see me go

—but I am very happy to join my Beloved of the Universe. Rejoice at my

joy, and don’t be selfish by sorrowing. If you knew how happy I am to go to

meet my beloved God, you wouldn’t be sad; rejoice to know that you will

someday join me in the festivity of eternal bliss.”

Drink Deep of Bliss

Now, after observing faces that register pleasure, sorrow, boredom, or

temporary peace, wouldn’t you rather that your face reflect the contagious

ever new joy of Spirit? To be able to do this you must drink and drink of

His bliss from the cask of deep meditation until you become a bliss

alcoholic, manifesting bliss in sleep, dreams, wakefulness, and all

circumstances of life that might otherwise tend to make you boisterously

happy, or abysmally sad, or saturated with boredom or temporary negative

peace. Your laughter must echo from the caverns of sincerity. Your joy must

flow from the fountain of your realized soul. Your smile must spread over

all the souls you meet and over the whole universe. Your every look must

reflect your joyous soul and spread its contagion to gloom-drunk minds.

Stop dreaming that you are just an ordinary mortal, constantly going

through mental ups and downs. No matter what happens, remember always

that you are made in the true image of Spirit. The living joy in all things—

the Fountain of Cosmic Bliss—must shower you with Its spray, and send

joy trickling through your thoughts, through every cell and tissue of your

whole being.

Remember, for many hours in the state of deep dreamless sleep, which is

unconscious soul-perception, you are happy all the while. So during the

day, regardless of how much you are disturbed by nightmarish mental trials

and upheavals, you must keep trying all the time to be inwardly ever newly

joyous, like the ever-fresh laughing waters of a gurgling brook.

As a man can be drunk with liquor all the time by continuously imbibing it,

so also can you be drunk with true happiness by continuously perceiving

the joyousness of your soul after meditation. When you can constantly feel

the blissful after-state of meditation, you will live in ecstasy; you will be

one with the ever new Joy of your soul, and whosoever will be around you

will be like you—even as the constant touch of sandalwood makes the hand

fragrant. “Their thoughts fully on Me, their beings surrendered to Me,

enlightening one another, proclaiming Me always, My devotees are

contented and joyful.”1

1 Bhagavad Gita X:9.

Steps Toward the Universal Christ Consciousness

February 17, 1935

In this world we are limited by our thoughts. It is natural for us to be partial

to our own ideas, but because of this partiality we often fail to recognize

that the ideas of others may be bigger and better ones. When we learn to be

open-minded and not opinionated about anything, we grow in

understanding and wisdom.

A person is mentally free when his judgment is no longer influenced by the

prejudices, customs, and conventions that are imposed on him by racial,

national, and familial background. In the West you sit on chairs; in the East

we sit on the floor, because the climate is extremely warm and the air is

cooler near the floor. But one cannot say that everyone should sit on the

floor just because the East finds it more comfortable to do so. National

customs and conventions limit our outlook considerably; but as soon as we

become free from blind slavery to our provincial prejudices and habits, we

can see truly what is right or wrong in any other nationality.

As individuals we are to some extent limited by our desire to do whatever

contributes to our own personal good. Thus each human being is more or

less fenced in by his egoistic desires and experiences. As he increases the

range of his experience, his consciousness begins to stretch; it is like a

rubber band that can be expanded infinitely without breaking. Indeed, the

more you stretch your consciousness, the greater it will be.

Learning to love our relatives is simply a training in stretching our

consciousness. It is a preliminary practice in loving all others as we do our

relations, whom we think of as our own. We have to learn to look on family

and strangers alike, because all are children of God. He has given you

certain family members with whom you are practicing stretching your

consciousness. When the husband serves the wife, and she serves him, each

with the desire to see the other happy, Christ Consciousness—God’s loving

Cosmic Intelligence that permeates every atom of creation—has begun to

express itself through their consciousness. Whenever you do something for

someone else, without any selfish motive, you have stepped into the sphere

of Christ Consciousness.

If you limit your love to your family, however, you have only that much

capacity to express Christ Consciousness. When you love your neighbors as

your family, your consciousness expands and you express a greater degree

of Christ Consciousness. When you feel for all people with the love that

you feel for your own loved ones, when you have that soul preparedness to

do for anyone else as you would do for your own, then you are exactly

expressing Christ Consciousness.

Selfishness is destructive to one’s own interests; hence it is an unwise

policy in any relationship or endeavor. Many of the customs in India give

wonderful practice in expanding the consciousness through unselfishness.

The mother never eats until the children and the father have had their food.

As a result they feel for her and have a sympathetic desire to share choice

tidbits with her. However, to feel concern only for yourself and your own

few loved ones is still selfish. When you do something for others as

feelingly as you do for self and family, you leave the little territory of

selfishness and enter into the vast realm of Christ Consciousness.

So the first step toward Christlike unselfishness is to expand your

consciousness to include your neighbors’ interests and well-being. It is not

necessary to give everything away; but you should have an intense desire to

help others, and be prepared, mentally and physically, so that when the

occasion arises you can do the same for your neighbors as you would do for

yourself. You can do it, but you don’t. Whenever you find a lonely heart, or

a brother weeping by the wayside, and your heart goes out to that soul, your

consciousness impinges on the Christ Consciousness.

Human love has its limitations. Family feeling is hemmed in by

clannishness. Patriotic love is greater, for when you are ready to give up

your happiness for the welfare of your country, you have expanded your

consciousness on a much wider scale. And when you can feel for all nations

as for your own country, your love manifests in an even greater way—you

become a wider channel for the expression of the universal Christ

Consciousness. Jesus could say, “Who is my mother? and who are my

brethren?”1 because he was aware that there is only the one love of God

manifesting through all individual human relationships.

In my consciousness I see no difference in an American, an Indian, an

African, a German, a Frenchman, or an Englishman—that comes from the

training I received from my guru, Swami Sri Yukteswar. Most parental,

social, and educational training tends to foster prejudices. I love all races

and nationalities alike. I do not want to be limited by attachment to any one

country. After all, we are only Americans or Indians for a little while; when

we die we are all the same. If we are conscious of being world citizens, we

have an expanded consciousness.

Psychological Expansion of Consciousness

You can stretch your consciousness psychologically so that you no longer

feel for your little self, but rather for the good of the whole world as your

expanded self. That is one way of expressing Christ Consciousness.

Every day you think thousands of thoughts—about a thousand an hour.

When you are writing you are thinking, in about an hour and a half, twenty-

five hundred thoughts. The ordinary human being thinks about twelve

thousand thoughts a day. A deep thinker puts forth about fifty thousand. I

have found that by concentrating it is possible to produce as many as five

hundred thousand thoughts in a day.

I used to know a man in India who knew eighteen languages and was a

Master of Arts in twelve of them. Think how many thousands of thoughts

were passing through his brain! Yet he was never mixed up.

You are to some extent conscious of every thought that you think during

wakefulness. If you receive a pinprick anywhere on your body you are

instantly aware of it. That means your consciousness is present in each of

the trillions of cells in the body. At the end of sixty years can you remember

all the thoughts that you have had? It seems impossible. Yet all events of

your life have been recorded in your subconscious mind, and that mind does

recall most of those thoughts that were outstanding. The more you develop

concentration and memory, the more you can recall.

Conscious, Subconscious, and Superconscious Memory

The scope of the mind is very grand. God has given you waking

consciousness, subconsciousness, and superconsciousness. Your conscious

mind has certain limitations; after a few years it begins to forget various

things. But your subconscious mind has a greater memory capacity; every

thought and experience is stored in the repository of subconsciousness.

Your conscious mind may forget every word that I am saying, but your

subconscious mind is registering them all.

Behind the subconscious is your superconscious mind, which never forgets

anything. The superconscious mind has kept a record of everything you

have done, every thought you have thought. When death comes, all these

thoughts and experiences flash through your mind before you leave the

body. Those impressions that are strongest determine the environment and

habits of your next life.2

As an ego your consciousness is present everywhere within yourself, and is

therefore present in each thought that you think. If you can expand your

consciousness beyond ego into the realm of superconsciousness, you can

watch from that point all the thousands of thoughts passing through your

conscious mind. Those who have developed the superconscious mind can

remember all the thoughts of a lifetime, and of previous lives as well. In

divine memory nothing is forgotten. Our thoughts are real and they are

eternal, ever present in the ether. All the sounds of the earth are recorded,

also, in your superconscious mind. Thus Jesus could say: “Are not two

sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground

without [the knowledge of] your Father.”3

Think of fifteen hundred million people and the twelve thousand thoughts

that each one thinks every day. If your consciousness is aware of all those

thoughts, several trillions of them, then you have Christ Consciousness:

omniscience, conscious awareness of everything in creation.

God gives man a mental barrier so that no one else can know his thoughts.

You are alone with your thoughts even though you may be with many

people. Even those who have Christ Consciousness do not intrude on the

thoughts of others unless they are ordained by God to guide others, or have

been requested by their disciples to take that liberty in order to help them

perfect their sadhana.

Sympathy a Key to Christ Consciousness

If you would develop Christ Consciousness, learn to be sympathetic. When

genuine feeling for others comes into your heart, you are beginning to

manifest that great consciousness. When you talk unkindly about others,

you are far from the universal sympathy of Christ Consciousness. Jesus

said: “Bless them that curse you.”4 He practiced divine sympathy. Jesus

fought against those who were doing wrong; but he hated no one, because

he saw God in everyone. Lord Krishna said: “He is a supreme yogi who

regards with equal-mindedness all men....”5 Do not sully your own

thoughts and tongue by criticizing others. Be sincere with everyone, and

above all, be sincere with yourself. God watches you. You cannot deceive

Him.

God is the whisper in the temple of your conscience, and He is the light of

intuition. You know when you are doing wrong; your whole being tells you,

and that feeling is God’s voice. If you don’t listen to Him, He becomes

quiet. But when you wake up from your delusion, and want to do right, He

will guide you. He is always waiting for the time when you will return

Home. He sees your good and evil thoughts and actions, but they do not

matter to Him. You are His child just the same.

In your heart must well that sympathy which soothes away all pains from

the hearts of others, that sympathy which enabled Jesus to say: “Father,

forgive them; for they know not what they do.” His great love encompassed

all. He could have destroyed his enemies with a look, yet just as God is

constantly forgiving us even though He knows all our wicked thoughts, so

those great souls who are in tune with Him give us that same love.

The transcendental way to develop universal sympathy is meditation. The

man whose mind dwells in the superconscious state is always happy, always

wise and loving, and always retains the after-effects of meditation. If you

can retain effortlessly that consciousness you feel just after meditation, you

have attained superconsciousness. When someone unknown comes before

you, you will instantly know all about that person’s life. But Christ

Consciousness is still farther beyond: you feel everything in the universe in

your consciousness at the same time.

By developing sympathy for all, you can expand your consciousness and

learn everything there is to be known. Just as you are aware of your body

and limbs and thoughts and brain simultaneously, so when you have Christ

Consciousness you will feel the bodily sensations of every human being

you meet, and know all the thoughts they have ever had. When the scribes

and the Pharisees brought an adulteress before Jesus for judgment he said,

“He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.”6 How

did Jesus know about their private lives? He lived in the all-permeating

divine Christ Consciousness. In that consciousness you are able to feel what

others are doing and thinking. Sometimes you even forget momentarily in

which body you are living.

Metaphysical Way to Christ Consciousness

The metaphysical way to Christ Consciousness is through meditation and

holding on to the after-effects of meditation. There are persons who read a

few books on truth and then say that they have attained Christ

Consciousness, but you can have that consciousness only through deep

meditation and unceasing spiritual effort. So don’t say you have Christ

Consciousness until you have attained what I have described. Your present

consciousness is limited by the body, but when you expand it by deep

meditation, you will become aware of the feelings of all peoples. You will

be able to know all things. Marvelous realizations will come to you.

Sometimes, when that state comes, you feel yourself simultaneously in the

stars, in the moon, and in every blade of grass.

We are a part of the divine Christ Consciousness present in all creation.

Each individual intelligence is a part of that vast Christ Intelligence. We are

like the jets in the burner of a gas stove. There are many little holes through

which the flames are pouring, but under the burner there is only one flame.

We are little flames coming from the big flame of Life. Beneath all the tiny

jets of human life is One Life; behind the flowers, behind all nature, is One

Life.

When you feel your consciousness in every pore of creation, you have

Christ Consciousness. Beyond creation is Cosmic Consciousness. When

you lift your consciousness from creation and see the vast eternal joy of

God alone, you will be in Cosmic Consciousness. When you are in tune

with that Cosmic Consciousness which is beyond this creation, you will

understand that God begot His Intelligence in the womb of creation, the

“Virgin Mary”; and that this Intelligence of God the Father, which is

reflected or “born” in every atom of creation, is the Christ Consciousness or

“only begotten Son.”

The “Sons of God”

The Indian name for this universal Christ Consciousness is Kutastha

Chaitanya. In India we might also call it Krishna Consciousness, because

the consciousness of our great avatar Jadava Krishna, like that of Jesus

Christ, was in tune with the Christ Consciousness in everything. These two

great ones had discovered the One Life behind all life. By divine

concentration and will in meditation, they had withdrawn their

consciousness from the material world and seen that behind everything in

creation is the one reflection of God, the only son of God—the Christ or

Krishna Consciousness.

Jesus, Krishna, Buddha, Babaji—all are Christs. They had expanded their

consciousness to receive Christ Consciousness. St. John declared: “As

many as received him [the Christ Consciousness that was manifest in

Jesus], to them gave he power to become the sons of God.”7

My guru, Swami Sri Yukteswar, manifested the Christ Consciousness. He

was always calm, and all my thoughts and feelings were reflected in the

mirror of his calmness. Sri Yukteswarji wasn’t interested in what others

were saying; he was interested in what they were thinking. It was

impossible to dissemble with a true teacher such as my Guru! His

consciousness was aware of all that was going on.

The Christ Consciousness dwelt also in Lahiri Mahasaya. One day when he

was discoursing to his disciples on Christ Consciousness as explained in the

Bhagavad Gita, Lahiri Mahasaya suddenly cried out, “I am drowning in the

bodies of many souls off the coast of Japan!” The next day his disciples

learned from a newspaper account of the deaths of a number of persons

whose ship had foundered the preceding day near Japan.

Life and death are but a passing from dream to dream. They are only

thoughts: you are dreaming you are alive, and you are dreaming you are

dead. When you get into the great Christ Consciousness, you see that life

and death are dreams of God. Because Jesus lived in that consciousness he

could say: “Destroy this [bodily] temple, and in three days I will raise it

up.”8 He knew he could transform that dream of death into a dream of life,

even as God can.

Develop sympathy and unselfishness if you would expand your

consciousness. I have no consciousness of possession. I can leave

everything in a moment if God calls, for I am not bound to anything. And

yet all things are mine. In Christ Consciousness the whole world—everyone

and everything in it—is your own. The whole of space and everything in it

belongs to you.

When you begin to feel the sensations of others as though they were

happening in your own body, you are developing that Christ Consciousness.

When you cultivate this consciousness and therein understand that

everything is yours, you will have no prejudices about race or color. In that

consciousness you feel the love of a million mothers in your heart, not just

for a few but for everyone. You do not imagine it, you feel it—this love that

Jesus, Krishna, all of the great ones manifested—this universal intelligence

and love which is called Christ Consciousness.

1 Matthew 12:48.

2 “That thought with which a dying man leaves the body determines—

through his long persistence in it—his next state of being” (Bhagavad Gita

VIII:6).

3 Matthew 10:29.

4 Matthew 5:44.

5 Bhagavad Gita VI:9.

6 John 8:7.

7 John 1:12.

8 John 2:19.

Evenmindedness in a World of Change

First Self-Realization Fellowship Temple at Encinitas, California, August 3,

1939

In the West we find emphasis on physical comfort. When the weather is too

warm the Westerner suffers without something to cool him, and when it is

too cold he is miserable without warmth from artificial heat. But the

masters of India teach a different philosophy. They say that sensitivity to

heat and cold, pleasure and pain, accrues from the delusive suggestions of

the senses and man’s habit of catering to sensations; and that he who is wise

rises above all dualities. The great ones do not suggest that man discipline

himself to the point of doing injury to his system; rather, they advise that

when cold or heat is intolerable, one should free himself mentally from the

sensation, at the same time seeking a commonsense remedy for the

condition.

The Gita teaches: “Those who are attached to sense pleasures cannot gain

the mental equilibrium of meditation; they fail to receive union with God

through ecstasy (samadhi).”1 Learning to disconnect oneself mentally from

the disturbance of sensations brings peace of mind. That man who remains

untouched by the sensations that come and go, being neutral to their ever-

changing stimuli, manifests the soul’s essential changelessness; in that

unchanging consciousness he becomes one with the Changeless Infinite.

Slavish response to the various sensations of the body disturbs both mind

and soul. With the disturbance of the soul man loses his true nature, which

is calmness. God is present in the coldest and the hottest regions of the

earth; He is at the North Pole and in the African desert. He is not affected

by any extremes of His earth-creation, and we, being made in His image,

should behave like Him. He put us in this body that is subject to conditions

of heat and cold, pain and pleasure; but He wants us to look on these

dualities with evenmindedness. He wants us to rise above them. We should

develop endurance, without being rash. When we cannot avoid excessive

heat or cold, we should simply disconnect the mind from it. The more we

strive to practice this, the more the mind will free itself so that no unwanted

sensations can touch the consciousness.

Pain Is Perceived Only in the Mind

The skin’s surface does not feel touch sensations; they are experienced in

the brain. One cannot taste, touch, smell, hear, or see except through the

mind. We seem to experience taste on the tongue, but it is actually the brain

that registers flavor. Similarly, when some part of the body hurts, the pain is

really in the mind, not in the body-part. We have two instruments for

perceiving pain: the nerves and the gray matter of the brain. But we

perceive only if the mind allows a connection between them. Unless the

mind says there is pain, there is no pain. This is the marvelous discovery of

India’s great masters. Under chloroform you do not feel pain, because

sensations do not reach the mind. At the nerve endings there are fine fibers

through which the pain sensations are relayed to the brain. Chloroform

prevents the relaying of these pain signals.

The brain is the sensitive instrument of the mind, and all the sensations of

the body are reported to the mind through the nerves and the brain. The

mind, being identified with the brain, receives and interprets these

sensations. A mind made strong by the practice of powerful and positive

thinking is less affected by sensations of pleasure and pain. It recognizes

sensations in the way God intended—as a form of academic experience.

Sensitivity was given to man only to protect the body; without sensation,

one could cut himself badly and not know it. Sensitivity was never intended

to cause pain. Animals have not developed this faculty to the degree that

man has, hence they experience less pain. Otherwise, the cruelty practiced

on animals in some methods of killing would be intolerable. The lobster is

put in boiling water while it is still alive!

Because pain and pleasure are created by the mind, pain in the body can be

lessened by practicing control of the mind. Then one can experience a

sensation without its producing pain, receiving only its guiding or warning

message. The Bhagavad Gita goes very deeply into it, and that is what the

Gita tells us. Oversensitivity to pleasure and pain strengthens their effects;

reduced sensitivity makes one less subject to pain and less enslaved to sense

pleasures. I have trained my body and mind to be less sensitive and have

found myself free from sense disturbances. That training is the way to gain

freedom.

There was a doctor who had such mind power that he was able to perform a

major operation on himself. The very thought makes the mind protest that

one could not do it, because the mind has been enslaved by bodily

attachments. But mind can be made powerful by training. The more you

discipline your mind, the more it will be under your control. A pampered

child suffers greatly over even a little hurt; a Spartan-trained child may

hardly wince at serious injury.

You Can Free Yourself From the Sensory Dictators

In this respect the system of training given in India under great masters is

entirely different from that given in Western schools. Indian masters train

their students to free themselves completely from slavery to the body and

its sensations. The comforts and conveniences developed in the West

encourage pampering the body; as a result, little or no effort is made to

cultivate mental strength. In India we are trained from childhood to nip in

the bud the dictates of sensations. In my school at Ranchi we had the

children sleep on little mats on the hard floor, and they grew healthier.

Westerners are conditioned to too many external necessities in order to

sleep well or be at peace. In India we were taught to sit on the hot sand in

meditation. Gradually we could sit in the heat all day long; and in the cold,

likewise. As a result of this training I found such mental strength that

nothing can affect or disturb my consciousness. When I disconnect my

mind from the sense telephones, I am not bothered by anything.

Some years ago the weather was terribly hot—extremely so. Everyone else

was panting. I was getting by mental association the discomfort they were

feeling. I had intended to do some writing, but I was so uncomfortable I

could not concentrate. Then I chided myself, “What is the matter with

you?” And I prayed: “Lord, the same electricity makes the heat in the oven

and ice in the refrigerator. It is cool here.” All around me the atmosphere

became cool, as though a sheet of ice surrounded me. I began to feel great

inspiration and wrote without any difficulty.

Another time, many years ago, I was traveling across country in an open

touring car. Accompanying me were several young men, all Self-

Realization students, one of whom served as my secretary. He and I slept in

the car, sharing one small blanket. The night was freezing cold. When I

went soundly to sleep he pulled the blanket completely off me; and when I

half wakened from the cold I subconsciously pulled the blanket off him!

This went on for some time. Then my mind said: “Why are you behaving

this way? It is all right. You are warm!” I threw off the blanket and began to

meditate. My body became as warm as toast. The students were shuddering

with cold when they awoke two hours later and discovered me sitting there,

immobile. I was in divine ecstasy. They thought I had left my body! Roused

from samadhi by their exclamations, I smiled and said, “What is all this

commotion about? Let us resume our journey.” “But you were sitting in this

bitter cold with no coat or blanket!” they protested. Nevertheless, I did not

catch cold. I was the only one who was warm!

What you must do is discipline your mind to be more positive. If you make

up your mind you are not going to catch cold, you will be less likely to

catch one. The mind must be trained to overcome pain as well. Mental

sensitivity magnifies pain. To magnify pain is to forget the indomitable

image of God within you.

Habits Begin to Form at Age Three

The ancient sages of India taught that all habits begin to form in man at the

age of three. It is very difficult to change them after they are set. If your

family and environment create early prejudices in your mind, you may

carry them throughout life. One of the first things I learned from my guru,

Swami Sri Yukteswarji, was to overcome mental prejudices toward

sensations. At the time I first came to him for training, I invariably caught

cold if I didn’t use a blanket when the weather was chilly. But Master

taught me differently. As a result I became free of the cold-catching

tendency I was virtually born with. Until Master’s training, I had caught

colds one right after the other.

Some people say we should depend only on mind, and others believe we

should cater to bodily sensations. Both positions are extreme. According to

one theory, it is good to have a physical examination regularly to see how

the body is getting along, just as one has his car checked over periodically.

This is sensible enough, but remember, you are not a machine. If your

mental well-being is too dependent on the condition of the body, a time will

come when the mind is so enslaved by the body’s demands that no amount

of any kind of physical aid helps. This explains why we have chronic

diseases. The physical debility became chronic because the mind simply

refused to be master of the body.

In the beginning it is better to follow the moderate path. If you have a cut,

put a little iodine on it, but don’t depend wholly on medicines. Take

adequate, sensible precautions until gradually you can depend more on the

mind. Even great masters have used medicines, which are, after all, God-

created herbs and chemicals. Medicine is not necessary to a master, but to

show that God’s power works in countless ways he may sometimes choose

to use pharmaceutical remedies. In any event, victory lies in the power of

the mind. When you know with absolute conviction that you can do without

all medication with no ill effect, you are victor.

A certain master who had broken his arm had it treated and bandaged.

When a rich man came to visit him shortly after, his worried disciples

thought that the visitor, seeing their master with his arm in a sling, might

become disillusioned. “Don’t pay any attention to these devotees,” the saint

remarked. “They imagine that because you see my broken arm you will

think God doesn’t look after me anymore. And it is paining, too!” Another

time this same master was in ecstasy, singing about God, when he fell on a

small pile of hot charcoal nearby. Still he went on singing to God. When the

disciples picked him up, they discovered some of the hot coals clinging to

his back, burning the flesh. The devotees were alarmed, but the master

laughed and said calmly, “Well, why don’t you remove them?” He never

complained of any pain. Such is the mental aboveness masters show. On

this occasion the saint demonstrated that he was above pain, and on the

other he showed that he was capable of human suffering and of bearing it

humbly.

Develop an adamant attitude toward the body. “The ideas of heat and cold,

of pleasure and pain, are produced by the contacts of the senses with their

objects. Such ideas are limited by a beginning and an end. They are

transitory; bear them with patience.”2 Why be so sensitive about a little

cold or a little pain? Think of the agony of those who suffer in war. But

even stronger than the patriot is the spiritual man; he develops a greater

mental courage through disciplining his mind to endure, and ultimately rise

above, every kind of pain and trouble.

Man’s Life Is Totally Independent of the Body

The body is only a flesh-covered cage of bones in which the bird of life

stays for a time. The life itself is totally independent of the body. But the

life has become identified with the limiting conditions of the body; hence it

suffers. If you analyze body and mind you will find there is no connection

between them, except what you give. Only in the daytime do you accept the

sensations of the body. At night in sleep, when your mind is detached from

the body, you are not aware of its sensations; you feel a deep peace.

Being made in the image of God, man can live in the body completely

separate from physical sensations. But instead he adopts the conditions of

the body as though they were his own. To be free of sensations, one has to

separate himself mentally from the body. Therefore, the saints teach mental

detachment from both pleasure and pain. To understand and experience

mental aboveness, one must practice it. I have proved this truth to myself,

and I know how wrong it is to be sensitive. Catering to sensations is the

cause of all suffering and misery. God didn’t intend for us to suffer; He

created sensory perceptions to guide and entertain us in the form of mental

pictures. He meant for us to use the body-instrument wisely, not to become

so identified with it that it makes us miserable. St. Francis called the body

“Brother Donkey.” If one loves a pet dog with a deep attachment, he will be

sensitive to his pet’s sensations, even though he is not physically connected

with the dog’s nervous system. In the same way, our body-suffering is due

to too much mental attachment to “Brother Donkey.”

The mind must acquire greater control over the body. To be able to live by

the power of mind is wonderful, because the mind can do whatever you

want it to. How to start depending more on mind? Little by little habituate

yourself to heat and cold, to sleeping on a hard bed, to being less dependent

on accustomed comforts.

While I have been speaking to you I have been utterly unconscious of the

high temperature today; but just now as I mentioned the heat, I began to feel

it. Once I was lecturing in Milwaukee when the weather was extremely hot.

In addition, the heat inside my body had increased greatly, as it does when I

am speaking of spiritual things. My mind said, “You cannot continue the

lecture without wiping your face; it is wet with perspiration.” I reached into

my pocket for a handkerchief, but found none. Then I looked in the spiritual

eye and suggested to my mind, “There is no heat at all.” Immediately the

feeling of oppressive heat vanished; I was calm and cool.

The Right Way to Look at Death

Practice these things and see if what I am saying is not true. You can

increase pain by sensitiveness and lessen it by mental detachment. When a

dear one dies, instead of grieving unreasonably, realize that he has gone on

to a higher plane at the will of God, and that God knows what is best for

him. Rejoice that he is free. Pray that your love and goodwill be messengers

of encouragement to him on his forward path. This attitude is much more

helpful. Of course, we would not be human if we did not miss loved ones;

but in feeling lonesome for them we don’t want selfish attachment to be the

cause of keeping them earthbound. Extreme sorrow prevents a departed

soul from going ahead toward greater peace and freedom.

Most of the people living on earth today were not here a hundred years ago.

Others were here before us. And we who are now walking the streets of the

world will not be here a hundred years hence. It will be all over for us, and

the new generation will not give us a thought. They will feel, as we do now,

that this world belongs to them; but one by one they too will all be taken

away. Death must be good, otherwise God would not have ordained that it

happen to everyone. Why live in fear of it?

Those who are afraid of death cannot know their true soul nature. “Cowards

die many times before their death; the valiant never taste of death but

once.”3 The coward lives over and over again a mental picture of pain and

death. The valiant experience only the final death, quickly and without pain.

If one dies of natural causes or is spiritually advanced, the body of

sensations simply drops off, and when the consciousness reawakens on

another plane it has all the sensations of the body without any physical

form. Awareness is all mind, just as it is in dreams. This is not difficult to

picture. In death one merely sloughs off his gross physical body, which is

only a lower form of mind and the cause of all manner of troubles for the

soul.

Exude Peace and Goodness

There are roughly two kinds of people: those who continually lament what

is wrong with the world, and those who smile away life’s difficulties and

remain always positive in their thinking. Why take everything so seriously?

How wonderful this world would be if everyone were more positive, more

harmonious!

In the jungle of civilization, in the stress of modern living, lies the test.

Whatever you give out will come back to you. Hate, and you will receive

hate in return. When you fill yourself with inharmonious thoughts and

emotions, you are destroying yourself. Why hate or be angry with anyone?

Love your enemies. Why stew in the heat of anger? If you become riled, get

over it at once. Take a walk, count to ten or fifteen, or divert your mind to

something pleasant. Let go of the desire to retaliate. When you are angry

your brain is overheating, your heart is having valve trouble, your whole

body is being devitalized. Exude peace and goodness; because that is the

nature of the image of God within you—your true nature. Then no one can

disturb you.

Good and Evil Are Created in the Mind

In the ultimate sense, everything starts in the mind. Sin is created in the

mind. Little children go naked without any consciousness of sin. To the

pure-minded everything is pure. To the immoral everything is evil. An

undisciplined mind causes great havoc in our lives. Sense-enslaved minds

are the perpetrators of all wars, cruelties, and injustices.

God put you in this sensate physical form with the intention that you live in

the world as an introspecting soul, enjoying the movies of creation without

becoming identified with them. That is how God wants you to live: to

demonstrate mind-control not only when everything is rosy, but in the midst

of your troubles also. Far from just talking about it, Self-Realization teaches

you that self-mastery. The dance of life and death goes on all the time; but

man has the mental power to rise above all sensory experiences of change,

to be unaffected by life’s inconstancy. The Bhagavad Gita offers us sublime

assurance of this freedom: “The relativities of existence (birth and death,

pleasure and pain) have been overcome, even here in this world, by those of

fixed equal-mindedness. Thereby are they enthroned in Spirit—verily, the

taintless, the perfectly balanced Spirit.”4

When you manifest changelessness you become a king among souls.

Changeless within, even though body and mind are constantly changing,

you become one with the Changeless Infinite.

The teaching of the Gita is inimitable. It deals in minute detail with life as it

is, and shows how man should behave under all circumstances. It is correct

to say, “I am made in the image of God”; but having lost touch with that

image you must learn how to become one with it again. The message of the

Gita shows the way. Gold that has been covered with several layers of clay

will still be there, though hidden. To discover it you must break through the

clay. Similarly, many claylike strata of habits and sensations cover the

golden soul. This “mud” is the cause of man’s nervousness and fear—of all

ungodlike qualities. To remove the “mud” one must develop an impervious

mental attitude toward the body and the senses. What fears we have about

the body! I have pictured and experienced in my mind all kinds of suffering,

and have overcome them.

When the Soul Commands, the Mind Obeys

In order to realize you are made in the image of God you must rise above

fear and anger and destroy oversensitivity. Don’t be finicky. Say to

yourself: “Today I sleep in a bed; tomorrow I lie on the ground, it doesn’t

matter. All is the same to me.” Practice this mental neutrality, and the mind

will do exactly what you tell it. The mind is extremely tricky, but if you

train it, it will behave. When you say, “I can’t live without beefsteak,” the

mind echoes, “I can’t live without beefsteak.” But if you, the soul, give the

command, “Slavery, begone!” the mind will obey. So be not the servant of

the body or the mind. Freedom from sense slavery is the only way to peace

and happiness. No matter what the circumstances, rise above all mental

sensitivity and make yourself truly and everlastingly happy.

The state of complete tranquility of the feeling (chitta), attained by yoga

meditation, in which the self (ego) perceives itself as the Self (soul) and is

content (fixed) in the Self;

The state in which the sense-transcendent immeasurable bliss becomes

known to the awakened intuitive intelligence, and in which the yogi

remains enthroned, never again to be removed;

The state that, once found, the yogi considers as the treasure beyond all

other treasures—anchored therein, he is immune to even the mightiest grief;

That state is known as yoga—the pain-free state. The practice of yoga is

therefore to be observed resolutely and with a stout heart.5

1 Bhagavad Gita II:44.

2 Bhagavad Gita II:14.

3 Shakespeare; Julius Caesar, Act II, Scene 2, line 32.

4 Bhagavad Gita V:19.

5 Bhagavad Gita VI:20 –23.

Paramahansa Yogananda at the White House, Washington, D.C.

Paramahansa Yogananda and Mr. John Balfour leaving the White House

after a call on President Calvin Coolidge, who is looking out of the window.

The Washington Herald, January 25, 1927, reported: “Swami Yogananda

was greeted with evident pleasure by Mr. Coolidge, who told him he had

been reading a great deal about him. This is the first time in the history of

India that a Swami has been received officially by the President.”

The Balanced Life (Curing Mental Abnormalities)

1925

Try to visualize a group of misproportioned human figures—one with a

peanut-sized head and a body as fat as a balloon, another with one arm

developed like that of a Sandow, but with the physique of a dwarf, and

another with a top-heavy head fitted to a frail Lilliputian body. Would it not

be (according to your mood) a very amusing or pathetic spectacle if you

suddenly beheld a crowd of such people?

Now visualize another group of people who are normal so far as their

physical form and appearance are concerned, but who are mentally unsound

and deformed. As clothing hides scars, sores, and some deformities, so also

the neat-looking garb of human flesh often covers serious mental maladies.

If you were confronted with a vast crowd of average people, well-dressed

and physically healthy, and if you were gifted with the power to see their

mental bodies, what a surprise and heartache you would have. You would

observe their mental bodies—with reason as the head, feeling and senses as

the trunk, and will as the hands and feet—to be abnormal, diseased, and

deformed. You would see that some have a tiny head of undeveloped

wisdom attached to a bulging trunk of sense appetite. Some would possess a

withered body of pep and feeling, with the arm of business faculty very

much overdeveloped in proportion. Others perhaps have a large, creative

brain, but the trunk of sympathy and feeling is shrunken and dried up. Still

others, normal in head and body, would be seen to possess impotent

paralytic legs of will and self-control. You could go on and on.

Such multitudinous psychological deformities in pathological mental

bodies, underdeveloped in some directions and overdeveloped in others, lie

concealed within man, causing suffering to his soul and hampering its

expression on the material plane.

It would not be out of place here to name a few of such psychological

diseases, so that these invisible but prime causes of all havoc in human life

may be detected and their presence made known to the unconscious

sufferers. Such persons may thus learn the nature, silent growth, and

symptoms of these defects and guard against the secret onslaughts of their

happiness-destroying powers.

Spiritual Melancholia

This disease is prevalent among those who are mentally and physically idle

under the pretext of being too busy with spiritual things. These sufferers

neglect the great and small duties of material life in the name of serving

God, and thus invite the devil to work his mischief in them. They suffer

from pessimism and lack of appreciation for all things good and beautiful in

the material life. This is a contagious disease, and all spiritual aspirants

must guard themselves against it by keeping their blood of energy warm

and immune with constant healthful worthwhile activity.

Spiritual Indigestion

This results from indiscriminately swallowing a lot of mental patent

medicines in the form of pseudo-spiritual books and lessons by quack

spiritual doctors. This disease kills not only the real hunger for Truth, but

also destroys the power to discriminate between good and bad teachings.

He who eats theological ideas all the time, and eats anything that he can get,

will not only overeat but will consume poisonous ideas along with the good,

inviting first, spiritual indigestion, and finally, spiritual death. Long-

continued overstudy of all sorts of philosophical principles and treatises,

without any effort to assimilate them and test them out in one’s own

practical experience, results in doubt, indifference, and disbelief in all

spiritual laws.

Sowing Mental “Wild Oats”

Those afflicted with this disease lead a purposeless life, through having too

much time or money on their hands and lacking a true aim in or

understanding of life. They are whim-led, doing anything that comes into

their heads, filling life with cheap novels, exciting movies, or other

unproductive pastimes. They do not realize their malady until some terrible

shock or nervous breakdown overtakes them.

Mental Cold

This disease is called despair. You don’t know when you are going to catch

it and suffer from its unpleasant symptoms: congestive pains of

despondency, intolerance, and impatience. Worst of all, it hangs on for a

long time, and the victim easily becomes reinfected even after seeming

recovery.

Mental Catarrh

This disease consists in harboring chronic worldly worries. Sufferers

usually neglect to use their powerful weapon of will and therefore passively

yield to their constant fears instead of fighting and routing them.

Psychological Fixation

Its victims become one-sided in the pursuit of happiness. They begin to

think that money is happiness, or that fame is happiness, or health, or

power. They sacrifice everything else—youth, reputation, peace of mind—

on the altar of their all-consuming ambition. They learn too late that the

balanced life—observing all the laws of nature and of God, and combining

activity with calmness—alone can bring happiness and fulfill man’s natural

destiny.

Sufferers from psychological fixation become wholly obsessed with some

one ambition until their perspective on life is warped and distorted. One

man, for instance, was very successful in his business and amassed a

million dollars; but before he could use it he died of excessive worry and a

nervous breakdown. Others, to gain fame, sacrifice their self-respect and

sincerity. Sufferers from this disease of one-sidedness miss their true goal

and can never derive real satisfaction from the possession of the longed-for

objective, since man’s nature is many-sided and demands all-round

development.

Religious Fixation

This ism-fanaticism among so-called spiritual people results from clinging

to some dogma or opinion without putting it to the test of experience, and

causes paroxysms of anger and hatred against the tested laws of Truth and

liberal rational thought. This religious madness leads to disobedience to

God’s simple laws of mental efficiency, material prosperity, and physical

health.

Spiritual Principles Should Be Taught

Physical diseases, being tangible, painful, and repugnant, arouse our active

resistance, and we seek to remedy them by exercise, diet, medicine, or some

other definite method of cure. But psychological diseases, though the root

cause of all human woes, are not prevented or attended to promptly and are

allowed to wreck and devastate our lives.

Educators, physical culturists, preachers, reformers, doctors, and lawmakers

will hasten the true progress of civilization only when they themselves first

learn, and then teach others, how to develop harmoniously all the factors of

life and of man’s nature. This is the true education and all-round human

culture that all the world is seeking.

Educational authorities deem it impossible to teach spiritual principles in

public schools because they confuse them with the varied conflicting

religious dogmas. But if they would concentrate on the universal principles

of peace, love, service, tolerance, and faith that govern the spiritual life, and

devise practical methods of growing such seeds in the fertile soil of the

child’s mind, then the imaginary difficulty would be dissolved. It is a great

mistake to ignore this problem just because it is seemingly difficult.

Many college graduates leave their universities with a top-heavy, book-

inflated head, and are unable to walk straight on the path of life because

their legs of will and self-control have been almost paralyzed through

disuse. They tumble headlong into the pit of wrong marriage, sex misuse,

inordinate dollar-craving, and business failure because they have not been

taught any use of their college-sharpened mental blades of smartness except

to hurt themselves. Many young men seem to take pleasure in doing those

things that react to their own disadvantage and suffering in the end. Last

year in America young men ranging in years from fifteen to thirty stole a

billion dollars by the “hold-up” method. Who was responsible? We are—all

of us. They also are vicious who do not prevent the spread of vice, and who

do not teach others to be virtuous through their example. Schools, colleges,

and society have not tried scientifically to prevent crime by eliminating its

true mental cause.

“How-to-Live” Schools Are Needed

Why not take the proper educational steps to avoid this annual theft of a

billion dollars, and use some of those millions for creating “how-to-live”

schools, where the art of living and a balanced development of all human

faculties would be taught?

I consider properly organized schools as gardens where infant souls are

grown and nurtured. The gardeners should be well selected and given

cooperation by parents and the public. We should never neglect teachers,

for they are soul molders. The care and spiritual nourishment of the early

life of a human plant usually determines its later development.

I sincerely praise the modern school system of America and its constantly

improving methods of intellectual and, to a certain extent, physical training.

But I cannot fail to point out its main shortcoming: a lack of spiritual

background. The system badly needs to be supplemented with moral and

spiritual training. The boy who belongs intellectually to Class A, or who is

a great baseball or football player, often attracts notice and is encouraged by

the teacher, but very few observe or warn him rightly if he is leading a dark

Class D moral or spiritual life.

Where is there such a school, one that adopts definite measures for

developing the whole nature of man, teaching him the true art of life and

fitting him to go through the various minor tests and ultimately the final

examination of life? Such schools are urgently needed to teach the arts and

sciences of all-round growth.

In such a “how-to-live” school, the science of physical, mental, and

spiritual development should be taught to children whose minds are still

plastic and whose energies are as yet unguided into any definite channel.

Adults too may master the subjects in night school, if they will exercise

willingness and patience while the good habits are displacing the

undesirable ones.

After a thorough training, the students of such a school should undergo

ceaseless introspective examination throughout life; and the various

diplomas won will be health, fame, efficiency, wealth, and happiness.

The results of the final examination at the end of this earthly sojourn will be

determined by the sum total of achievements and mental and spiritual

diplomas won at the various examinations throughout life. Those totally

successful in this last great examination will receive a diploma of divine

self-sufficiency, a free and joyous conscience, and blessings, engraved

eternally on the parchment of the soul. This rare reward is incorruptible by

moths, beyond the reach of thieves and the eraser of time, and is awarded

for honorable entry into the Fellowship of Truth.

Increasing the Power of Initiative

May 23, 1927

Looking at the vast panorama of this world, at the crowds of humanity

rushing hot-haste through their span of life, one cannot but wonder what it

is all about. Where are we going? What is the motive? What is the best and

surest way to reach our destination?

Most of us rush aimlessly, like runaway automobiles, without any plan.

Dashing heedlessly along the road of life, we fail to realize the purpose of

our travel; we seldom notice if we are on winding devious ways that lead

nowhere, or on straight paths that lead directly to our goal. How can we

find our goal, if we never think of it?

Many people, though unaware of life’s destination, nevertheless have

enough initiative to determine what they want and to seek it. In connection

with their personal desires and with changing their environment, they try to

use the initiative within them to create what they want. What is that

initiative? It is a creative faculty, a spark of the Infinite Creator within each

one of us.

Think of a dozen people you know; aren’t the minds of most of them like

one-horsepower engines? Many people make similarly limited use of their

creative energies. The whole process, the main activity of their lives,

consists chiefly in eating, working, amusements, and sleeping. When life is

so lived, what is the difference between man and the animals? One

difference, psychologists say, is that man is the only creature that laughs. It

is good to laugh; if you don’t employ that power, you lose one aspect of

strictly human development. Don’t be like those people who, day in and day

out, take life so seriously they are afraid even to smile. They don’t enjoy

life at all.

Besides the unique ability to laugh, man has another superior quality, one of

the greatest of all qualities—initiative. What is this mysterious faculty?

America is a land of initiative in business, in applied mechanics; India is a

land of initiative in spirituality. Initiative is the power to create; to create

means to do something that nobody else has done; it is trying to do things in

new ways, and trying to create new things. Initiative is that creative ability

which is derived directly from your Creator. What have you done in your

life with this divine gift? How many people really try to use their creative

ability? Weeks, months, years pass, and they are always the same; they have

not changed, except in age. The man of initiative is as glorious as a

shooting star—creating something from nothing, making the impossible

possible by the great inventive power of the Spirit.

Don’t Be a One-Horsepower Person

There are three kinds of people with initiative—the extraordinary class, the

medium class, and the common class; and there are hundreds of others

huddled together in a “no man’s land” of nonentity. Ask yourself this

question: “Have I ever tried to do anything that nobody else has done?”

That is the starting point in the application of initiative. If you haven’t

thought that far, you are like hundreds of others who erroneously think they

have no power to act differently than they do. They are like sleepwalkers;

the suggestions coming from their subconscious mind have given them the

consciousness of one-horsepower people. If you have been going through

life in this somnambulistic state, you must wake yourself by affirming: “I

have man’s greatest quality—initiative. Every human being has some spark

of power by which he can create something that has not been created

before. Yet I see how easily I could be deluded with the mortal

consciousness of limitation that pervades the world, if I allowed myself to

be hypnotized by environment!” But if you say, “Every avenue of activity is

already overcrowded; why try at all?” you are allowing yourself to be

hypnotized by a frustrating worldly consciousness. That is why in every

walk of life so many men, lacking initiative, remain unsuccessful.

On the spiritual side, also, many people passively follow the same path

throughout life. Even though unsatisfied, they unthinkingly remain in the

denomination to which their families belong. Or perhaps they were born

Baptists, but a change of residence places them near a Congregational

Church, so they become Congregationalists. Man ought to adapt himself

conscientiously, according to his inner dictates, to all life’s experiences. He

should not act blindly.

My guru, Sri Yukteswarji, used to say, “Remember this: if you have within

you that faith which is truly divine, and if there is something you desire that

is not in the universe, it shall be created for you.” I had that indomitable

belief in an inner strength, in the spiritual strength of my will, and I always

found that some new opportunities were created to give me the things I

wanted.

The power of initiative within you remains undeveloped, unformed,

unexploited, unused. That power is native to the soul; it has actually been

given to all of you, but you have not used it. How can you acquire

initiative? If you have not developed the power to think creatively for

yourself, or the initiative to make your own way, your first attempt should

be to try to improve on what someone else has done. The effort to make

improvements on the inventions of others is the most common form of

initiative.

The second or medium quality of initiative is shown by people who write or

invent something new, but of no particular significance.

The best or most extraordinary quality of initiative is that which makes you

stand out before the world in a blazing flame, like a Burbank or an Edison.

Those were men of invincible initiative, spiritual initiative. Was God partial

to these great men, that they possessed this particular greatness? Were they

chosen by Divine Will to take so much glory? No. They simply used their

initiative to bring forth the greatness and the glory that is every man’s

birthright as an immortal child of God. Those who look for personal glory

are never great; inflated with pride, they lack any real support from God.

Those who enjoy giving—whether it be strength, courage, music, art—are

great men.

Most people who have become great have been subconsciously guided:

they had a tinge of greatness in their heredity that gave them an initial

advantage. They used that hereditary advantage in their life to become

extraordinary, to become outstanding. If you have a quality of greatness,

you have been unconsciously led by forces of mind whose power enabled

you to change your environment by reincarnating, and in that new

environment to bring forth the greatest flowering of your initiative. In this

sense, great men are “born.”

You Must Discover the Power You Have

But I know that great men can also be made, or developed from seemingly

nothing. There is a way to become great, to acquire this extraordinary

power of initiative. By wisdom, by right training, and by practice of the

Self-Realization teachings you can develop that power of initiative and

bring it into full play. The ones who made the struggle long ago are the ones

who now see the fruition of their activities. You must discover the power

you have; you must strive to overcome apparent impossibilities.

You must be prepared to withstand the critical opinion of the world in order

to succeed in a great way in any vocation. You must stay away from one-

horsepower people in order to be original—to think differently, to speak a

little differently. And be untiring in your zeal. The man of extraordinary

initiative swallows up all difficulties, believing in his heart that he is right.

With unflinching steadiness march on your path, realizing that behind you

is the infinite Creative Power.

You must first get yourself into conscious contact with that Infinite Power.

It is the Source of all initiative, and when you contact that superconscious

Power, your conscious and subconscious minds also become filled with

power. Long ago I was apprehensive lest the little initiative I had developed

would disappear quickly under difficult tests. I know now that within

myself is that great infinite Principle, which is the Source of all art, all

music, all knowledge. If That is behind me, I cannot fail.

Whenever you want to create something wonderful, sit quietly and go deep

in meditation until you have contacted that infinite, inventive, creative

Power that is within you. Try something new, but always be sure that that

great creative Principle is behind anything you do; and that creative

Principle will see you through. Every human being is meant to be guided by

the boundless creative power of Spirit. You have choked with doubt and

laziness the fountain of creative power within you. Clear it out! Show

dauntless determination in everything you do.

Most people are content to feed themselves on dead quotations, to go on

collecting the ideas of others, without ever showing the individuality that is

within themselves. What is distinctive about you? Where is the great

uniqueness of God’s power in you? You have not been using it.

The Lord’s Infinite Power Sustains You

I was reluctant, at first, to become a teacher—the implications frightened

me. A teacher has to be a shock-absorber; the minute he becomes disturbed,

he cannot help those who seek his aid. A true teacher has to love

everybody; he has to understand humanity, and to know God. But when Sri

Yukteswarji told me that my role in this life was to be that of a teacher, I

called on the Lord’s infinite power to sustain me. When I started to give

lectures, I made up my mind that I would speak not by book learning but by

inner inspiration, holding the thought that behind my speech was the

inexhaustible Creative Power. I have also utilized that Power in other

directions, to help people in business and in many different ways. I have

used mortal mind to reflect Immortality. I did not say: “Father, do it,” but,

“I want to do it, Father. You must guide me; You must inspire me; You must

lead me.”

Do little things in an extraordinary way; be the best one in your line. You

must not let your life run in the ordinary way; do something that nobody

else has done, something that will dazzle the world. Show that God’s

creative principle works in you. Never mind the past. Though your errors be

as deep as the ocean, the soul itself cannot be swallowed up by them. Have

unflinching determination to move on your path unhampered by limiting

thoughts of past errors.

Life may be dark, difficulties may come, opportunities may slip by

unutilized, but never within yourself say, “I am done for. God has forsaken

me.” Who could do anything for that kind of person? Your family may

forsake you; good fortune may seemingly desert you; all the forces of man

and nature may be arrayed against you; but by the quality of divine

initiative within you, you can defeat every invasion of fate created by your

own past wrong actions, and march victorious into paradise.

Though you be defeated a hundred times, be determined that you are

nonetheless going to conquer. Defeat is not meant to last for an eternity.

Defeat is a temporary test for you. Naturally God wants to make you

invincible, to have you bring into play the almighty power that is within

you, so that on the stage of life you can fulfill your high destined role.

God Meant the World for Our Entertainment

How are you going to find out what role suits you? If we all want to be

kings, who will be the servants? On the stage the parts of a king and of a

servant are equally important if the roles are played well. You must

remember that that is why we are sent into this world with differences, with

desires for various vocations. God meant the world to be a play, a huge

spectacle for our entertainment. But we forget the Stage Manager’s plan and

want to play our part as we see fit, and not as He desires.

You fail on the stage of life because you are trying to act a part different

from the one divinely designed for you. Sometimes the buffoon attracts

more attention than the king; so no matter how obscure your role, play it

conscientiously. Tune yourself with Spirit, and in this earth-drama you will

play your part well.

You are not meant to suffer. Those who play tragic parts must realize that

they are but enacting a role. Never mind which part you have to play;

always strive to act it well, in harmony with the direction of the Stage

Manager, so that your little role will enlighten others. Realize that an aspect

of the infinite power of Spirit is performing through you on the stage of the

world.

Infinite Spirit creates new success. Infinite Spirit does not want you to be an

automaton. Attune yourself to Cosmic Power, and whether you are working

in a factory, or mixing with people in the business world, always affirm:

“Within me is the Infinite Creative Power. I shall not go to the grave

without some accomplishments. I am a God-man, a rational creature. I am

the power of Spirit, the dynamic Source of my soul. I shall create

revelations in the world of business, in the world of thought, in the world of

wisdom. I and my Father are One. I can create anything I desire, even as my

creative Father.”

Who Made God?

Circa 1949

The enigmas of God’s creation, and of how He Himself came into being,

almighty and powerful, have been pondered in every heart that yearns to

know about God. No scripture has fully elucidated these seemingly

unanswerable questions. But if you contemplate and try to feel the entire

perception of the subject as I shall describe it, you will find the answers to

these questions—answers that I received from the very depths of my soul

and from God.

The Infinite, God, is the ultimate cause of all finite creation. He projects the

power of maya, the storm of delusive relativity—the illusion that the One

has become the many—which, blowing over the ocean of His Being and

His vibratory wish to create, stirs into manifestation the waves of finite

creation. “Unborn though I am, of changeless Essence! yet becoming Lord

of all creation, abiding in My own Cosmic Nature (Prakriti), I embody

Myself by Self-evolved maya-delusion.”1

Manifesting Himself as the creative Cosmic Intelligent Vibration, and using

the help of the storm of delusive relativity, God forms out of Himself all

finite vibratory waves of mind, energy, and matter: electrons, protons,

atoms, molecules, cells, and blocks of solid matter—clusters of island

universes floating in the sphere of space, surrounded by wandering

radiations.

Thus Intelligent Cosmic Vibration is the first manifested cause of all created

things, though the different finite forms of matter are created or caused

secondarily by arrangement and combinations of certain basic forms: cells

derive from molecules, molecules from atoms, atoms from electrons and

protons, electrons and protons from lifetrons, and lifetrons from

thoughtrons2 of the Infinite.

Creation exists, and is caused by God; therefore God exists. We can say that

intelligent creation exists because of an intelligent God. But who created

God, out of whom all things else have come? The Infinite Himself.3 The

law of causation applies only to finite objects; it does not apply to the

Infinite. As all waves on the ocean become dissolved in the ocean, so all

finite objects manifesting from the aforesaid finite causes lose themselves

in their Eternal Source. Similarly, the law of causation operates outwardly

in creation, but is lost in the Infinite.

Through the law of causation, our original parents—the finite creations

known as Adam and Eve, who themselves were special creations of the

Infinite—helped to create all humanity. Because we are created by our

parents—and our parents by our grandparents, and all mankind has come

from Adam and Eve—we ask who created God. We apply to the Infinite the

law of causation that created us. This is erroneous reasoning.

Varying Perspectives

When you are dancing with the waves of the ocean, you can’t get a

perspective of the ocean as a whole; but from the air you have a bird’s-eye

view of its vast expanse. Similarly, when you concentrate on creation and

are immersed in it, you cannot see anything but creation and the law of

causation working therein. But when with closed eyes you learn how to

look within, you see neither finite forms nor the law that created them, but

glimpse the formless, causeless Infinite.

In the wintry land near the North Pole, an Eskimo who was hunting seal

looked up and saw a Hindu traveler approaching him.

“Where did you come from, my friend?” he asked.

“My home is India,” the stranger replied.

“Well, well!” said the Eskimo. “Do Hindus find plenty of good seal meat in

India?”

“Oh, no, we don’t have any at all,” replied the amused visitor. “Hindus live

mostly on vegetables.”

“What a foolish statement,” thought the Eskimo. “No one can live without

seal meat!”

Just as the Eskimo, knowing no other diet, thought all people ate seal meat,

so finite creatures, being themselves created by the law of causation,

naturally think that the Infinite God also came into being through the law of

causation.

Spirit Is Free From Causation

So it is foolish error for finite, causation-born human beings even to

question, “Who made God?” The Infinite made the law of causation that

created all finite things, though the Infinite Itself exists without having been

caused. As an absolute monarch may make all the laws in his kingdom

without being bound by them, so the King of the Universe makes all the

laws in His kingdom, including the law of causation that governs His finite

creation; but He is not subject to His laws. “I, the Unmanifested, pervade

the whole universe. All creatures abide in Me, but I do not abide in them.”4

Though present in all things, God is in no way bound by finitude.

Therefore the Infinite is. We deduce His existence and omnipotence from

His powerful manifestations in creation. His power is fully active in the

manifested state. And during cosmic dissolution, all power, cosmic

intelligence, and the law of causation become inactive and dissolve into the

Absolute, there to await the next cycle of God’s creative manifestation. The

forces of the storm that create waves in the ocean are manifest in the waves.

But no power is manifested when the ocean is still. Similarly, in the creative

state, the Infinite manifests intelligence, mind, vibration, forces, and matter.

And in the unmanifested state, the Infinite exists solely as Spirit, in which

all forces lie dissolved. Out of space come light, nebulae, and weather, and

into space they dissolve and hide again. That sphere beyond manifestation

is the hiding place of Spirit.

The Infinite, beyond the categories of vibratory intelligence, energy, space,

and time, is thus a thing in Itself. It can be felt and known as the eternal

Power that exists without a beginning or end. Creation is caused by God,

but God simply is. No one, nothing made God—He has been and will be

what He is forever and forever. “O Arjuna! there is nothing higher than Me,

or beyond Me. All things (creatures and objects) are bound to Me like a row

of gems on a thread.”5 This cannot be understood so long as you consider

yourself a created being, subject to laws of cause and effect. But as soon as

you become one with God in ecstasy, you will know exactly how and what

God is—Beginningless, Endless, Causeless. Then, being one with Him, you

will know that you too are the Causeless Eternal. As a mortal man you are a

creation made by God; as an immortal man of realization, you will know

yourself as a wave in the ocean of God, the one and only, self-sustaining,

ever-existing Cosmic Consciousness.

1 Bhagavad Gita IV:6.

2 The name given by Paramahansa Yogananda to the first and most subtle

manifestation of the creative vibration emanating from Spirit; the primal

ideas behind all matter. Thoughtrons compose the ideational or causal

universe, from which emanates the astral universe of lifetrons, intelligent

life energy; from which in turn emanates the physical universe of gross

atomic energy. (See causal world in glossary.) (Publisher’s Note)

3 “Not-Being was not, Being was not then....

The One breathed windless, of its own power.

Beyond this there was naught whatsoever....

The root of Being in Not-Being was found

By sages tracing it with understanding in their hearts.”

— Rig Veda X:129

4 Bhagavad Gita IX:4.

5 Bhagavad Gita VII:7.

The Missing Link Between Consciousness and

Matter

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, 1932

The difference between a stone and the thought of a stone is very great: a

stone has weight and dimension, and is visible and tangible; the thought of

a stone is invisible and intangible, without weight or dimension. Likewise

the physical body of, let us say, Henry Jones, manifests weight, form,

dimension, and visibility; the thought of Henry Jones has none of these

qualities of matter. Yet a powerful mind, versed in the art of visualization,

can in a hallucination or a consciously produced dream see Henry Jones,

shake hands with him, weigh him on a scale, and see that he is tall and

slight. A visualization, hallucination, or even a dream representation of the

body of Henry Jones is more real than the mere thought concept of his

body, because dream objects are apperceived by the senses of touch, taste,

smell, sight, and hearing.1 What then is the difference between a thought of

Henry Jones; a visualization, hallucination, or dream perception of Henry

Jones’s body; and his living physical body?

Difference Between Illusion and Delusion

One could take the view that the physical form of Henry Jones is real

because visible to all, and that the dream conception of him is unreal

because visible to only one person. Is it not possible, however, that the

reality of the physical body of Henry Jones—and of all other human beings

—is a delusion? From India has come the philosophical concept of maya,

delusion or mental error common to all individuals; and of avidya,2 illusion

or mental error as experienced by each individual.

On the other hand, one individual may understand certain truths that are not

similarly realized by all. Thus men of divine understanding, who have

experienced the truth about the nature of God and man, are sometimes

wrongly accused of illusions and hallucinations by those who are yet in

thrall to cosmic delusion. It is not right for those under maya to decry the

testimony of one who is not. Only he who has transcended cosmic delusion

through his own inner realization may correctly judge the truth.

The average person thinks of the physical body perceived by the senses as

real, and regards a mental, imaginary, or dream concept of the body as

unreal. Let us suppose that by television a picture of Henry Jones’s form is

transmitted from Detroit to the Los Angeles Times headquarters. Are the

viewers in Los Angeles seeing the real Henry Jones? The ordinary person

would say yes.

The Cosmic Magician’s Grand Illusion

A metaphysical master sees delusion within delusion as illusion. He can see

the physical body of Henry Jones as a delusive form—like a mirage of a

city—not nothing, but something, yet not what it appears to be. The man of

realization would ask what makes us so sure that the physical body is not a

delusion shared by everyone? Can we be certain that all human beings are

not merely dreaming about the body of Henry Jones and other material

forms? If man really is circumstanced by God to dream within a cosmic

dream, then we all may be dreaming the existence of the body of Henry

Jones. In which case we cannot distinguish whether the body of Henry

Jones actually exists or not.

By certain stereoscopic and vitaphonic effects, the great magician Thurston

might show to his audience the form of Henry Jones floating in the air and

talking, and suddenly spirit it away. Is it not possible, then, that the great

Cosmic Magician might be showing us true-to-sound, true-to-sight, true-to-

touch superpictures of the body of Henry Jones and of everyone and

everything else in creation? If so, then anyone under the influence of this

stereoscopic vitaphonic superdrama might create the form of Henry Jones

by mental motion pictures of his own—”home movies,” you might say. In

this case, the people who are under the cosmic delusive influence created by

God would think, “That person is suffering from illusion,” even though they

themselves are victims of the cosmic delusion by which they see the

metaphysically untrue, but mundanely true body of Henry Jones. So, if

everything in creation consists of dream pictures in the consciousness of

man, then all is delusion, and the mental picture or hallucination of one

person, based on the reality of the physical body of Henry Jones in this

cosmic dream-world, is delusion within delusion, or illusion.

The wise man who awakens from the influence of the cosmic dream

perceives the physical body of Henry Jones and all matter as a delusive

cosmic dream, and the mental concept of matter or Henry Jones as a

delusive dream within God’s cosmic dream. A mental error or illusion in

one person can be corrected by others who do not participate in the error;

but an error shared by all cannot be corrected by any except those who have

attained Self-realization, and who thereby know the truth that “things are

not always what they seem”3 to the senses.

How Consciousness Became Matter

The only difference between consciousness and matter, mind and body, is

rate of vibration. Vibration is the motion of energy. How did this motion

originate from the Cosmic Intelligence? All the vibrations in the ether are

manifestations of the Intelligence-guided cosmic energy. Spirit as the

unmanifested Absolute is without vibration or motion. Spirit manifested as

the Creator is God the Father. The Creator first stirred His still Spirit with

the motion of thoughts; thus God the Father’s first projection of creation

was cosmic intelligent motion, or vibration of thought.4 This motion

became stronger and grosser until it changed outwardly and manifested as

cosmic light and cosmic sound (registered in the human body as the visible

spiritual eye and the audible cosmic sound of Aum or Amen). The vibration

of the conscious cosmic energy became progressively more gross, until it

began to manifest as divine, semi-intelligent, instinctively guided electronic

energy, and finally as the still grosser forms of gaseous, liquid, and solid

energy.

Likewise the microcosm, or body of man, came into being first as a

vibratory thought-form, the causal body. This in turn produced the grosser

vibrations that make up the astral or energy body of man, which produces

the still grosser vibrations that structure the solid physical body. Just as man

uses electrically projected light and shadows and sounds to create a

stereoscopic vitaphonic picture of a human being on a movie screen, so the

Cosmic Operator combines various thought-frozen vibrations of cosmic

light and energy to produce in man’s consciousness the “picture” of a solid

physical body.

Wrong Thoughts Obstruct God’s Perfect Thought-Pictures

By partially obstructing light from the projector, the projectionist of a slide

film may produce on the screen a picture of a man without a hand; he can

easily restore the hand by letting the light flow freely through the film.

Similarly, the consciousness or manifestation of disease is nothing more

than an obstruction, created by wrong human thought, in the perfect

thought-feeling of man that God created. Man is heir to the failings of his

forefathers. Hereditarily he has become habituated to imperfection. His

wrong thoughts not only obstruct the perfect thought-pictures of life and

body, they also impede the free flowing of the cosmic life force, which is

responsible for manifesting and perpetuating the delusive picture of the

human body.

The amputation of a hand in an auto accident is no more real than is the

amputation of the hand of the man on the film screen in the foregoing

illustration. However, unless one is an accomplished “projectionist,” he

may not be able to correct, in the superpicture created by God, a distortion

of seeming hurt or disease in his body. The delusive nature of bodily

accidents cannot be known until one can transfer his consciousness into the

operating chamber of Cosmic Consciousness and get acquainted with the

secret methods of the Cosmic Projectionist. By His self-evolved cosmic

thought-films and self-frozen cosmic energy, He is trying to show perfect

pictures of man (made “in His own image”), and of all life, all worlds, and

the cosmos. Through ignorance, man has fallen out of tune with the divine

will, and thus obstructs the perfect presentation of God’s stereoscopic

vitaphonic superpictures of life.

A block of ice is solid, heavy, cold, and visible. If allowed to melt, it

becomes liquid, yet has the same weight, remains cold, and is still visible,

but in a different form. If electricity is passed through the melted ice, it

becomes invisible hydrogen and oxygen. So the one block of ice can be

changed from a visible, cold, solid mass to invisible, intangible gases with

the same weight. The process may be reversed, and the gases recondensed

into liquid and frozen into the vanished block of ice. Similarly, the solid

human body can be reduced to liquids and evaporated into invisible gases;

but man has not yet learned how to bring it back in its original form. Not

yet does he know the link between mind and body, Spirit and matter. That

missing link is cosmic energy.

Finely vibrating conscious energy becomes pure consciousness, and,

vibrating at increasingly grosser rates, manifests as the body. When by use

of his will man attains supreme control of the energy in his body, he will be

able to melt the vibrations of his solid physical body into astral energy, and

the astral energy into mental energy. And by the same method he will be

able to materialize his consciousness into the astral body and condense it

into the physical body. The Gita refers to this power. “He who realizes by

yoga the truth of My prolific manifestations and the creative and dissolving

power of My Divine Yoga is unshakably united to Me. This is beyond

doubt.”5

Scientists today can control chemical changes of the body, but they do not

yet understand the biochemical control of matter. With understanding of the

relation of will and body comes the realization that the body is not

dependent on food chemicals alone, but on energy supplied by the will from

the invisible cosmic source. The will is the chief bringer of life force into

the body. Like a human dry battery, a human body in a state of suspended

animation can live without oxygen, sunshine, solids, liquids, breath, or heart

action; but deterioration inevitably follows when consciousness, and

therefore will, has completely left the spinal column and the brain regions.

Will, the Cosmic Energizer

Every movement of the body parts presupposes movement of will, and with

every action of this invisible radio of will, energy is radiographed into the

body from the storage battery in the brain and the conscious cosmic energy

surrounding the body. When you are tired you can put energy into the body

by eating food, or by inhaling oxygen, or by absorbing ultraviolet rays of

sunshine, or by drinking water or other liquids; but as you tense your arm

and body in willing to lift a heavy weight, you are bringing energy into the

body by the invisible mental force of will. In the tensing of body parts with

concentrated will,6 we find the only instance whereby we can create energy

in the body; not from physical sources outside the body, but from the

invisible source existing both within and without the body—the intelligent
cosmic energy of God.
To attain mastery over cosmic energy, the missing link between
consciousness and matter, body and Spirit, is to realize the true nature of the
Self—of everything in creation—and the oneness of all with the Creator.
1 The instruments of sensory perception (eyes, ears, etc.) belong to the
physical body, but sensory perception itself is a function of man’s astral
body of subtle electricities. Thus, in dreams and hallucinations the senses
function through the subconscious mind, independent of their physical
instruments. (See astral body in glossary.)
2 See avidya and maya in glossary.
3 Phaedrus, Book IV, Fable 2, 5.
4 The great Albert Einstein was very close to the truth when he wrote: “I
want to know how God created this world. I am not interested in this or that
phenomenon, in the spectrum of this or that element. I want to know His
thoughts; the rest are details.”
5 Bhagavad Gita X:7.
6 Reference is made to the Energization Exercises taught to students of the
Self-Realization teachings. (See Energization Exercises in glossary.)

Is God a Father or a Mother?

First Self-Realization Fellowship Temple at Encinitas, California, May 14,

1939

I feel pity for those who have never known the love of a mother, for they

have missed a great experience. Every mother is a manifestation of God’s

unconditional love, though human mothers are imperfect, and the Divine

Mother is perfect. I pray that all mothers live such a godly and impartial life

that their limited human love becomes transmuted into the pure all-

embracing love of the Divine Mother.

My mother was everything to me. My joys rose and set in the firmament of

her presence. I was still but a boy when Father and I, in Bareilly, received

word that Mother was seriously ill. We entrained at once for Calcutta:

Mother had gone there to supervise preparations for the wedding of my

elder brother Ananta. At a transfer point we were met at the station by my

uncle. I felt a terrible conviction that Mother was already dead. I asked

anxiously if she was still alive. A train was thundering toward us, and I had

inwardly determined to throw myself beneath its wheels if Mother were

dead. Correctly interpreting the desperation in my face, Uncle replied, “Of

course she is alive!” But when we reached our Calcutta home, Mother was

gone. I was inconsolable. I loved Mother as my dearest friend; her solacing

black eyes had been my surest refuge. I have described in a poem an actual

experience of mine at that time:

Merely affection-saturated, many black eyes called—

Offering to nurse

My motherless sorrow—this orphan life of mine.

But none matched the love-call glance

Of those lost two dark eyes.

The love of those two black eyes

Had forever set

From the region of all black eyes that I beheld.

Seeking those two eyes

In birth and death, in life and dreams,

And in all the lands of the unknown,

At last I found

The all-pervading Divine Mother’s

Countless black eyes

In space and heart,

In earth-cores, stars, within, without,

Hungrily staring at me

From everywhere.

Seeking and seeking my dead mother,

I found the Deathless Mother.

The lost love of the earthly mother

I found in my Cosmic Mother. Seeking and searching,

In Her countless black eyes

I found those two black eyes.

If only you could share with me the thrill that I felt when I suddenly became

aware of those black eyes of my Mother watching me from everywhere,

from every speck of space! What an experience it was! All my sorrow

became changed into joy.

Human relationships are given to you, not to be idolized, but idealized. If

you always think of your mother as the unconditional love of the Divine

Mother manifested in human form, you will be comforted when she is gone.

The mother who has passed on is not lost to you; she is a representative of

the Divine Mother, who came to mother you for a short time and then was

taken away, to remain concealed behind the omnipresent love of the Divine

Mother. Those who have lost their mother must find the Divine Mother

hidden beyond the skies. You don’t pray deeply enough. Implore Her with

continuous demand, with the resolve not to cease until Her reply comes. If

you will pray in this way as earnestly as I did, you will receive an answer

from the Divine Mother; and you will see your earthly mother.

Now I behold every woman as a mother. Even when only a little goodness

is reflected there, I see the Divine Mother. Men should look upon all

women as mothers; they do not know what they miss when they look upon

woman merely as an object for the satisfaction of passion; they see then

only the evil that is within themselves. In the mother aspect of womanhood

there is purity. Woman was given the motherly instinct to save man from

the pitfall of evil. That is her primary purpose; she was not created as an

object of lust. Nothing is more sacred than the unconditional sympathy of

woman toward man. A stern, dignified court judge is but a child to the wife

in his home. Every woman should feel love for all the world if she would

manifest the Divine Mother’s love. To inspire mankind with mother love is

to bestow the greatest blessing a woman possesses.

God Is Both Father and Mother

In creating this universe God revealed two aspects: the masculine or

fatherly, and the feminine or motherly. If you close your eyes and visualize

vast, illimitable space, you become overwhelmed and enthralled—you feel

naught but pure wisdom. That hidden, infinite sphere wherein there is no

creation, no stars or planets—only pure wisdom—is the Father. And Nature

with her diamond-dazzling stars, the Milky Way, the flowers, birds, clouds,

mountains, sky—the countless beauties of creation—is the Divine Mother.

In Nature you behold the mother aspect of God, full of beauty, gentleness,

tenderness, and kindness.1 The beauty in the world bespeaks the creative

motherly instinct of God, and when we look upon all the good in Nature,

we experience a feeling of tenderness within us—we can see and feel God

as Mother in Nature.

So God is both Father and Mother. The Christian and Hindu scriptures

describe God as triune: Father, Son, Holy Ghost—Sat, Tat, Aum. The

Father is the wisdom aspect of God; Holy Ghost, the mother aspect; the Son

is cosmic creation—the emblem or principle through which the father and

mother aspects of God express their divine love. We are the children of that

love. “As above, so below”—in the human family we see in miniature the

greater family of the Holy Trinity: God the Father represented in the human

father; Holy Ghost or Nature manifested in the mother; the Son symbolized

in the child, expression of the love of both father and mother.

Jesus spoke of God as Father. Some saints speak of Him as Mother. In His

transcendental aspect, God is neither Father nor Mother; but when we think

of Him in terms of human relationship, He may become for us either Father

or Mother. God is both infinite wisdom and infinite feeling. When He

manifested Himself in creation, God gave His wisdom a form in the father;

and He gave His feeling a form in the mother. Each, alone, is imperfect,

only half of God’s nature, because the father moves and is moved by

reason, whereas the mother moves and is moved by feeling. The father

wants to govern the child by reason; the mother, by feeling.

The mother says, “Teach him by love.” Sometimes a great deal of love is

good; but if you give too much sweetness, and that only, you may spoil the

child. Sometimes a little strictness is good, but severe punishment for errors

only drives a child to greater error. This is why the two aspects of God must

be manifested through the parents in the upbringing of the child; both are

necessary for its ultimate welfare. Every father should strive to temper his

reason with love, and every mother to temper her love with reason.

When I think of my guru, Sri Yukteswarji, I see in him the sternness of a

father and the kindness of a mother, without the weaknesses or blindness of

either. Every father and every mother is potentially endowed with both the

fatherly wisdom and the motherly tenderness of God. They have to perfect

these endowments. Parents so easily become blind to the faults in their

offspring! If you can’t see your child’s faults, there is something wrong

with your love. Parents should learn to love their children unconditionally,

without allowing love to blind them to errors in a child’s action or thinking.

They should love their child in spite of any misdeed, but should not support

him in his error. Help your children to extricate themselves from the pitfalls

of evil, rather than drive them farther down by supporting them in their

wrongdoing. They won’t return any love to you for that misguided

indulgent love.

Pure Reason and Pure Feeling Are Intuitive

Pure reason and pure feeling both have intuitive qualities. Pure feeling sees

as clearly as pure reason. Most women have a keenly developed intuition.

Only when they become unduly excited do they lose their intuitive powers.

Pure reason is also intuitive, if this power is sufficiently developed.

Otherwise, should the premise be wrong, the conclusion will be wrong also.

Sooner or later, every man who reasons clearly will develop true intuition,

which never errs.

A jealous, hateful, angry woman will see these qualities reflected in others.

If she continually harbors such destructive emotions, she will lose, alas, her

intuitive gifts. For this reason every woman should strive to be less

emotional and to keep herself free from wrong emotions. She will then

develop that intuitive mother-aspect of God. My mother had great intuition

because she was entirely free from jealousy, hate, and anger.

God never forsakes anyone. When, having sinned, you believe your guilt to

be measureless, beyond redemption; and when the world declares you of no

account and says you will never amount to anything, stop a moment to

think of the Divine Mother. Say to Her, “Divine Mother, I am Your child,

Your naughty child. Please forgive me.” When you appeal to the mother

aspect of God there is no retort—you simply melt the Divine Heart. But

God will not support you if you continue to do wrong. You must forsake

your evil actions as you pray.

Confession embodies a sound principle. The act of confessing may be

likened to calling a doctor when you are ill from transgressing health laws.

You are obliged to tell the doctor your symptoms, and he forthwith

prescribes for you, and you receive healing. But if you violate nature with

wrong practices time after time, you will never remain healed. I know a boy

who always boasts, “I can do anything I please, for I will be forgiven next

week when I confess.” This is the wrong view. If you don’t forsake the evil

as well as confess it, you will not be forgiven.

The divine man develops both the fatherly and motherly qualities in

himself. He can feel toward anyone the same love a mother has for her

children. These were the feelings of Jesus when on the cross he said:

“Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” How could he

know such love for those who were crucifying him? He had developed both

the fatherly and the motherly aspects of God. To Jesus the men nailing him

on the cross were not enemies with javelins and spears; they were his

children who didn’t understand him. Who but a mother could think of them

as Jesus did? A mother whose son is torturing her is afraid only of what

may happen to him. This is what Jesus understood; this is how he could say,

“Father, forgive them.”

If you develop the motherly aspect of God, you will feel love for all the

people of the world. And if you appeal to God as the Divine Mother, She

quickly gives in, for you have appealed to Her tenderness and unconditional

love. When you worship God as the Mother, you can stand and face Her

and say, “Divine Mother, naughty or good, I am Thy child. I may have been

in the clutches of evil for many incarnations, but do I have to make full

recompense according to Thy law? I cannot wait so long a time to enter

Your presence! Mother, please, forgive me! Why must You exact

punishment of me? What is done is done. It is all past. I am not going to sin

again.” The Divine Mother may reply: “You are naughty; go away from

Me.” But you must say, “You are my Divine Mother. You have to forgive

me.” Then She says: “Ask of Me salvation; I will give you salvation. Ask of

Me wisdom, and I will give you wisdom. But do not ask of Me My love, for

when you take that away I have nothing.”2 If you continue to cry, “I want

Your love!” the Divine Mother finally melts: “Since you are My child, and I

am your Mother, how can I but forgive you?” And She gives you Her last

possession—Her divine love.

A Vision of Divine Mother

In India I used to visit the great saint Master Mahasaya.3 On my first call at

his home I happened to disturb him at his devotions. He invited me to sit

down, adding: “I am talking to my Divine Mother.” His whole countenance

shone with the reflection of Her love, and I could feel the intense vibrations

of that great love. Whenever I was in his presence while he was communing

with the Cosmic Mother, the love I experienced in my heart was a thousand

million times more than that I felt for my earthly mother, whom I so dearly

loved; at such times I thought I could not exist another moment without my

Divine Mother.

“How is it that you can commune with the Beloved Mother and I cannot?” I

said to him one day. “Please ask Her if She loves me. I must know!”

Insistently I pleaded until finally the saint agreed.

“I will make your plea to the Beloved.”

That same night in meditation I had a great divine experience: Seeking the

seclusion of my small attic room as soon as I arrived home, I meditated

until ten o’clock. Suddenly the darkness was lit with a beauteous vision.

The Divine Mother stood before me, tenderly smiling.

“Always have I loved thee! Ever shall I love thee!” With these words She

disappeared.

It was barely sunup the next morning when I hurried to the saint’s home. I

saw by his eyes that he was wandering in the gardens of the Infinite; such

love of God is rarely seen.

“Did the Beloved Mother say anything about me?” I asked.

“Mischievous little sir!”

“What did Divine Mother say? You promised to tell me,” I chided.

Again he answered, “Mischievous little sir!” I knew in my heart that he

could see through my subterfuge, yet I had been deliberately hiding my

thoughts in order to learn if my experience the previous night was real.

“Why so mysterious?” I said. “Do saints never speak plainly?”

“Must you test me?” he replied. “Could I add a single word this morning to

the assurance you received last night from the Beautiful Mother Herself?”

Bliss flooded my being. I prostrated myself at the saint’s feet; I knew the

Divine Mother was walking in them. He it was who gave me the revelation

and the understanding of the mother aspect of God. He told me that later my

Guru would come to me, one who would be endowed with the wisdom

aspect of God: “Through his guidance, your experience of the Divine in

terms of love and devotion shall be translated into his terms of fathomless

wisdom.”

A Test of Faith

I will tell you a little story about Divine Mother and an experience I had

with Her. On the grounds of Self-Realization Fellowship headquarters there

is a small wishing well of cast concrete. Shortly after its purchase I was

helping the boys to move it into place. The well accidentally slipped and

fell with all its terrific weight on my foot. There was terrible pain and much

swelling in the foot, which seemed completely mashed. I was carried to my

room. My friends wanted to call a doctor.

“If Divine Mother tells me to see a doctor,” I said, “I will go to one. If She

does not, I won’t go.”

I waited, hoping to feel inwardly what Her wish might be. Day by day the

pain in my leg became almost unbearable; there was no sign from Divine

Mother.

The following Sunday I had a large class to teach. It seemed that I would

have to be carried to the platform. I could not get my foot into a shoe. Satan

tempted me that Sunday, saying, “Why don’t you pray to be healed?” But to

pray would have been to doubt. Divine Mother knew my plight, and I was

willing to abide by Her wish.

“I am not going to pray,” I said. “The Mother knows what is wrong with

me.” Inwardly I vowed my unconditional surrender to Her: “Whether sunk

beneath the wave of death or moving on the oceanic waves of life, I am

with Thee evermore.”

“Look at these people,” Satan spoke again. “They will all laugh at you.

They have never seen you sick before, and now they will see you with an

injured foot.”

“I don’t care.” Once you have Divine Mother’s love, neither praise nor

blame can touch you.

I was limping along toward the platform where I was to speak, when

inadvertently I slipped on the threshold; my injured foot was badly twisted.

So great was the pain, I felt as if every bone in it had splintered. But the

moment I stepped forward again the terrible swelling collapsed suddenly,

all pain gone; I was able to slip my foot into a shoe.

That was one of the greatest demonstrations of the power of love that I have

ever experienced. I walked as if nothing had ever been wrong with my foot.

Needless to say, I was thrilled—not because of the healing, but because of

the Divine Presence. She wanted to see if I would pray for a healing. Had I

prayed, perhaps in due course of time the injured foot would have had a

natural recovery; but I would not have had that all-assuring divine

experience.

Another time, in Palm Springs, I was singing to the Divine Mother:

“Mother, I give You my soul call. You can’t remain hidden anymore! Come

out of the silent sky, come out of my cave of silence.”4 Suddenly She

appeared! I saw Her in the stones, the palms, everywhere! God has no form,

but to please a devotee He can take any form that devotee desires. You have

no idea how wonderful the Divine Mother is; how great She is; how loving

She is!

There is no greater experience than to feel and know that the Cosmic

Mother is with you. Watch for the presence of the Mother, because She will

look after you in every way, whether your trouble is sorrow, pain, or

sickness. Pray to God as the Divine Mother when you crave solace, and

when you seek wisdom pray to God as the Divine Father.

Mothers, do not limit to your child alone the all-forgiving love you bestow

on him. Give to everyone the love and understanding of the Divine Mother,

and you will be bound no longer by the limitations of an earthly mother’s

love; you too will be a divine mother. When you can truly say, “I feel as a

mother to all mankind,” you will no longer see others as strangers; you will

recognize and love all children of the world as your own. All forms of

human love, in the perfect state, are encased in the love of God.

Judge yourself no more a sinner; cast off your wrong habits and pray,

“Mother, I am Thy child. Reveal Thyself!” If you send this appeal to God as

the Divine Mother night and morning, unceasingly, She will manifest

Herself unto you.

Let us give thanks to God, and pray for His blessing on all mothers, that

they be enabled to manifest His qualities.

May all the sons and daughters of the world be filled with that motherly

affection which is the reflection of the Divine Mother’s unconditional love;

and may they give that unconditional motherly love to one another, that we

have peace and heaven on earth.

1 In this context, Paramahansa Yogananda is emphasizing what we have

come to regard as true “motherly” qualities, the gentle and loving responses

we find in a mother’s nature. On other occasions, Paramahansaji has also

pointed out that form and qualities presuppose manifestation, and

manifestation presupposes relativity. Mother Nature must also enforce the

inherent and inexorable cosmic laws of the universe. Break those laws, and

Divine Justice dispenses its corrective punishment; hence the fierce

demonstrations we sometimes behold in nature. These are results of man’s

own wrongdoing, which throws the cosmic harmony out of order. (See

karma in glossary.) But the consistent beauty of Divine Mother is that if the

devotee appeals to Her unconditional love, She may be persuaded to

assuage the retaliatory power of those laws. Thus in Hinduism, Divine

Mother is sometimes depicted as Kali; her four arms symbolize cardinal

attributes, two beneficent and two destructive—the essential duality of

Mother Nature. (Publisher’s Note)

2 From an old Bengali song. It has been translated for the West by

Paramahansa Yogananda in Cosmic Chants. (Publisher’s Note)

3 See chapter 9 in Autobiography of a Yogi.

4 “I Give You My Soul Call,” from Cosmic Chants.

Paramahansa Yogananda welcomes Indian Ambassador B. R. Sen, Mme.

Sen, and Consul General Ahuja upon their arrival at Self-Realization

Fellowship International Headquarters in Los Angeles, March 4, 1952—

three days before the great yogi’s passing.

The Art of Developing Memory

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, August 28, 19321

By virtue of the faculty of memory, human beings are unique. The souls of

all creatures, through unconscious recollection of their divine origin, tend

naturally to seek their Source. This accounts for the upward evolution of

everything in the universe. But, in conformance with God’s plan for

creation, it is only upon attaining a human body, with its superior brain and

nervous system, that each soul is at last endowed with the means to

remember consciously its original oneness with Spirit.

Memory is that power by which we mentally reproduce our experiences. If

it were not for memory we would forget all our perceptions of life; we

would have to start afresh, like infants, every day. A person who has “lost”

his mind, and hence his memory, behaves like a child.

There is no value in having experiences if we cannot recall and relive them.

We learn by introspection and by analyzing our past behavior. In man’s

memory lies the value of being a human creature. John remembers that he is

John each morning upon awakening; and it is through memory that he

associates his life experiences with his identity as John.

Whenever we wish it or need it, any experience that we have had can be

reproduced by the subconscious mental faculty. By remembering what we

have done before, we can perform again some skillful action that we have

learned, or reason out which actions to repeat or avoid in a particular

situation.

The subconscious mind is always active, recording experiences during the

daytime and working even in sleep, looking after the bodily house like a

night watchman. Upon waking, one always knows whether he has had a

good or a bad sleep. That memory power of the subconscious mind is a

faculty of the ever awake, ever joyous Lord. Implanted in each soul is the

memory seed of that consciousness, for the soul knows itself to be ever

living in God. Memory is the seed of immortality by whose cultivation we

may recall all the events of this life and of our past lives.

Develop Divine Memory

If we can remember all our experiences as mortal beings in this life, why is

it that we do not recollect all the divine experiences that have happened in

the soul? Memory has two natures: mortal memory reproduces the

experiences of this life, and divine memory reproduces the experiences of

the soul throughout all its incarnations. Most people are aware only of

mortal memory.

Why is our divine memory asleep? Some people are able to recall many

experiences, both mortal and divine; others cannot well remember even

their recent past. Memory has different grades in different people according

to brain capacity. Education, concentration, meditation, and various

memorable experiences are required to develop a good memory. Without

developing memory one cannot become a well-educated person. If one has

an experience and subsequently forgets it, all values of that experience are

lost to the conscious mind.

By improving the quality of memory, we can make it powerful enough to

remember all things, even our divine origin. By awakening the divine

memory, whereby we can recall every experience of all our past lives and

ultimately realize our immortal soul nature, salvation is attained.

Effect of Physical Exercise on Memory

Asanas2 and proper physical exercise are useful in developing memory

power. Today, when machines have replaced manual activity in so many

functions and departments of life, man is becoming physically lazy and is in

dire need of regular exercise. He has begun to devise mechanical and other

types of indoor equipment to help him exercise his body.

When one performs physical exercises, it is necessary to concentrate the

mind on the activity in order to reap the fullest benefit. It is not just the

flexing of muscles, but the inner power of concentration to awaken and

redirect the life force that gives the body strength.

Foods That Increase Memory Power

There are certain foods that are brain foods; and there are muscle foods,

nerve foods, and foods that help to build up and maintain the different body

organs. As an aid in developing memory we should eat foods that increase

brain power. Proteins are helpful in developing memory. Ground-up pecans

and almonds, mixed with a few drops of lime or orange juice and taken

before bedtime, will improve one’s brain power, yogis say; milk and cheese

also are good brain foods.

Yogis suggest that, at times of worry or strain, one should drink the juice of

one or two limes in a glass of water, rinse the head with cold water, and

apply cold water on the temples, between the eyebrows, and at the nostrils

and ears. The nerve processes are calmed immediately, the mind becomes

more peaceful, and good memory returns.

Avoid eating too many fatty foods, which tend to cause fatty deposits to

build up in the blood vessels on the surface of the brain. The Hindus say

that pork and beef are injurious to man’s health; these two meats contain

much uric acid. The pig and cow have poor memories. By eating their flesh,

man may develop their physical and mental traits.

Practice Exercising Memory

Memory can be developed by exercising it. It is incorrect to say that a man

who was born a physical weakling can never become strong. There is

always the possibility of becoming and accomplishing something greater in

all departments of our lives. One has to know how to seek the right ways.

Similarly, according to some doctors, a person who has a hereditary mental

weakness will retain that mental defect to the end of his days. But it has

been proved that many mental deficiencies may be overcome by the

practice of concentration exercises. There has been little research in this

direction in the West; hence many psychologists are unacquainted with the

art of deep concentration, which has been taught for centuries by India’s

great yogis.

The correct methods for developing concentration are unknown to most

people. The mental faculties are there, but they are not developed. Failure to

develop one’s mental capacities eventually leads to serious trouble. The

brain, like the physical body, requires right exercise for health.

To develop a good memory, therefore, one should not only exercise the

body and eat health-building food, but should also engage in mental

discipline. Make an effort to remember things. Practice the art of

visualization: look at a certain object or at scenery and then try to reproduce

that picture in your mind. Trying to recall the strains of songs and chants,

and singing them mentally, develops memory. Anything that is done with

feeling, or that rouses feeling, develops memory. Both poetry and music

have emotional values. All of us remember easily the greatest sorrows and

the greatest joys of our lives. Why? Because those experiences were felt

deeply. Anything that one strongly feels develops one’s power of memory.

Writing poetry, and adding and subtracting mentally are also good methods

for developing memory and concentration.

Meditation Strengthens Memory

To increase one’s power of memory, one should do everything with deep

attention. Most people carry on their activities absentmindedly; there is a

great gulf between their actions and their thoughts. That is why they cannot

remember anything very well. What one wants to recall he should perform

with great attention. One should not be fussy, but whatever he undertakes

should be done with his whole mind. In church one should listen to the

sermon with keen attention. Work at tasks in the home with attention and

interest. Keeping the conscious mind on the task at hand does not prevent

one from reflecting constantly on God in the background of his mind. But

when one meditates, he should think only of God. The power of memory is

strengthened by meditation.

What is meditation? Becoming one with the soul. It means banishing the

consciousness of being related to the body and to human limitations, and

trying to remember that one is a soul. When man begins by conscious

mental effort to relate himself to the immortal soul, rather than to the body

that he inhabits for one life only, he will recall more of his past-life

experiences, and will eventually remember that he has come down from the

bosom of God. In Him lies the memory of all the experiences of one’s life

and of all lives. When man communes with his soul within, the forgotten

times and powers of the deathless Self will come back into his

consciousness. Meditation means to remember that one is not a mortal body

but an immortal soul, one with God.

During the daytime we tend to think of ourselves as human beings, but at

nighttime in deep dreamless sleep we forget our mortal attitude. In

meditation we can try consciously to forget our mortal identification; we

can abandon the consciousness of the body and remember we are Spirit.

Those who persevere in this practice will become masters.

Remember Good Experiences

Memory was given to man to reproduce good. To abuse the power of

memory is harmful. To think hatefully of another person because of some

remembered injury he inflicted on you is a misuse of memory. However, to

recall unhappy experiences in order to learn the lessons inherent in them is

a proper use of memory, as then one may analyze his past behavior and

avoid repeating in future the wrong acts that brought painful results. One

should not bring back any wrong thought and relive it; for then it will stay

longer in the mind. Memory was given to us to keep alive only life’s good

experiences and lessons. Get rid of wrong past thoughts by avoiding

recalling them. If they come to mind in spite of you, refuse to entertain

them.

Let me repeat: to remember bad experiences and dwell upon them is an

abuse of God’s gift to us of memory. Rather one should vow, “I shall use

memory only to recall good thoughts and experiences. From this moment I

banish from my mind all unpleasant memories. They belong to the mortal

being. I am a child of the Spirit. I am going to see, hear, taste, touch, feel,

and will everything that is good. I shall take only the good from my life’s

experiences and shall preserve only the good in my memory.” Banish

forever the abuse of memory.

A person who feels good emotions, and thinks good thoughts, and sees only

good in nature and people, will remember only good. Memory was given to

you to practice the recollection of good things until you can fully remember

the highest Good, God. Beholding goodness in everything, you will

certainly find that one day the Invisible Power will shatter all the little

windows of thoughts and sensations and feelings through which you have

been seeing only glimpses of the divine harmony in creation; you will

behold through an infinite opening the omnipresent Goodness, God.

Rouse the eternal flames of divine memory until they burn away your

forgetfulness, and you remember that you always have been, and are even

now, one with the Lord.

1 This talk was one of a series of outdoor Summer School classes that

Paramahansaji conducted at the headquarters on Mt. Washington. He taught

under a large pepper tree that he called “The Temple of Leaves.”

2 Bodily postures of Hatha Yoga. (See Hatha Yoga in glossary.)

Man’s Eternal Quest

First Self-Realization Fellowship Temple at Encinitas, California, February

16, 1941

The flowers outside1 are so beautiful, but behind them is a garden still more

lovely. Though it is very subtle and hard to discern in the beginning, if you

can penetrate to the inner realm through the door of the spiritual eye2 you

will discover it. I live in that garden—a region of exquisite qualities, of

tender thoughts more sweet and fragrant than any flower. There the bee of

my mind is continuously drinking the honey of God’s presence.

As we interiorize our concentration and live more and more in that invisible

land within us, we find that our soul qualities take special forms; each

materialization is a window through which we perceive the Lord’s

indescribable sweetness. Don’t think that the search for God consists only

in meditation. Every good quality that you express in thought and action

yields the hidden nectar of God’s presence, if your inner perception is deep

enough.

When we pass through the door of the spiritual eye, we see inside ourselves

the factory of intelligent Life Energy that has created the whole universe.

Because we don’t concentrate within, we are mystified by the imprints of

the invisible Spirit in nature. We behold the productions of God; His name

is written in the flower and in the sky, in everything—but He is silent. As

human beings we are very much privileged, for among all God’s creatures

man alone has the physical, mental, and spiritual endowment necessary to

seek Him, to find Him, to know Him, and to understand His language of

silence.

What Is a Successful Life?

A child pictures success as having all kinds of playthings, and perhaps a toy

car to ride in. A poor child thinks how happy he would be if only he had a

lot of toys. A wealthy child, on the other hand, may be bored with his

playthings; he has a restlessness in his soul. In time it may become very

difficult to please the child of the rich, for he already has so many

possessions. When we are older, we laugh at the desires of our childhood;

and who knows but that whatever we are wishing for now, thinking it will

bring the fulfillment of our life’s dream, will one day have little significance

for us? I found this to be so. I didn’t want to become drunk with emotions,

heedlessly bent on the follies I saw others pursuing, and I looked farther on.

If we gaze a little ahead we can see for ourselves that most of the things we

think we want are not going to make us really happy.

Success is necessary in order to possess the essentials of life: food, clothing,

shelter, and health. If you don’t have these to at least a certain degree, you

are in a wretched position. You should be able to attain the minimum

amount of comfort and happiness that you are seeking. Whether one is a

spiritual or a material idealist, all persons can agree that there are a few

basic physical needs that must be met so that man can preserve his bodily

temple. Unless he maintains this temple, he cannot succeed in anything

else.

Happiness Is a Creation of Our Own Mind

But what is real success? If you attained everything you wanted in this life,

you would eventually become disillusioned anyway. By analyzing I saw for

myself that the only pleasure I had in anything was that which my mind

gave to it. If I withdrew my attention, enjoyment of any object vanished.

Thus I saw that pleasure is internal, a concept of one’s own mind. The

beauty of your most valued possession, which you may be holding in front

of your eyes, disappears when your thoughts are absent from it. Only when

you put your mind on it do you perceive its loveliness. Therefore it is

reasonable to say that within us, and not outside us, lies most of the

happiness we are seeking.

We can magnify our happiness or minimize it. One person has a little home

and says, “I enjoy it more than a palace.” Someone else has a palace in

which he does not take as much pleasure as the other person has in his

unpretentious cottage. The secret of success and happiness is inside you. If

you have found success and prosperity outside, but not inside, you are not

truly successful. A millionaire who is not happy is not successful. I don’t

mean that if you have a million dollars you cannot be a success. Whether

you are rich or poor, if you get happiness out of life you are a real success.

Pleasure that lasts only for a moment and leaves you with regret afterward

is not happiness. In true success, even though the first excitement of delight

in some accomplishment fades away, the gratifying memory of fulfillment

remains. All the good things that you have done in your life stay on in your

memory as a joy forever. They are the real success that you have attained.

To Be Happy Under All Circumstances Is Real Success

Success is not a simple matter; it cannot be determined merely by the

amount of money and material possessions you have. The meaning of

success goes far deeper. It can only be measured by the extent to which

your inner peace and mental control enable you to be happy under all

circumstances. That is real success. When you can look within and your

conscience is clear, your reason unprejudiced, your will firm yet flexible,

and your discrimination strong; and when you are able to obtain at will the

things you need and the things you consider worthwhile, you are a success.

As a child you could be happy with little things, but now you tend to think

you have to own several homes and cars, even though you can see that

those who have them are not invariably happy. Plain living and high

thinking make for contentment. Keeping your mind on the plane of ideas

will give you more happiness than if you dwell on externals. Those who are

preoccupied mostly with looking after their home, their possessions, their

dress, are not necessarily civilized. You can dress up a dog, but that doesn’t

make it civilized. The difference between man and the dog is that man can

voluntarily change his consciousness and his nature. He can penetrate deep

within, into the region of the Spirit, where the dog cannot. Man’s love is

transcendental. When we die, the dog may grieve for us a little while, in

some cases till death, but human friends never forget us (if they don’t want

to!) throughout incarnations. So mankind has tremendous advantages over

other creatures.

Evolutionary Human Progress Lies in the Power of Thought

As a human being, you make your greatest evolutionary progress by the

power of thought. Set aside some time each day to improve your mind. It is

more commendable to read awhile than to occupy yourself day and night

with housework or with noncreative activities. Plan your life so that you do

not live in a haphazard way; but if your tendency is to overorganize your

time, get away from that extreme also. Balance is necessary in every avenue

of life. Instead of using your mind only to plan your everyday work and

other passing activities, or with idle mind letting your time slip away,

employ it some of the time in constructive reading. Have at hand some

worthwhile reading material, and peruse it during free moments. It is more

effective to have a variety of literature—a bit of science, a bit of history,

philosophy, biography, travel—anything that will expand and inspire your

mind.

Books can be dear friends, and if your selections are choice ones you will

experience much benefit from them. It may seem very hard at first when

you read Emerson or Milton or Plato, or some of the great saints, but after a

while you will find yourself thinking about what they have written. You will

feel you have gained something, because all those sages received their

wisdom from the infinite treasure-house of God—ideas that otherwise

might not occur to you in a lifetime.

However, many people read constantly and yet cannot tell you what they

have read. The best way to read a book is to introspect about it. See how it

applies to your own life. And learn to discriminate. Do not accept blindly

everything that you read; it should meet the tests of your mind. To be

worthwhile, books should cause you to think. If they do that, you will find

that your mind is developing.

Receive Knowledge Directly From Spirit

People who do not read or meditate, who live only externally, do not

develop any deep understanding. Meditation keeps you directly in tune with

the Power that evokes all thought. To touch that Supreme Power is

meditation. As a human being you do injustice to yourself if you don’t read;

but to meditate is still better. I would like to read, but I can scarcely finish

two pages before I am called to attend to something else, so I have given up

reading. I find it more profitable to meditate. As I go deep within, radiant

lights appear and great joy comes, joy that remains with me all day long.

Such is my experience. Such is the experience of all who commune with the

ever blissful Lord.

Don’t waste your time. God wants you to be a balanced individual. If you

allow your life to become unbalanced you will be punished by the cosmic

law. Live simply, have daily physical exercise, study rewarding books, and

cultivate the habit of daily meditation. If you meditate you will find much

more happiness than you have ever known. All knowledge will be given to

you from within.

My life has been that way. I have not read twenty books since I came to

America twenty years ago. I am not proud of the fact; I would have been

wholly ignorant if I hadn’t had, through meditation, the consciousness of

Spirit. When I look at a book I see that whatever truth it contains has

already been given to me from God. All thought and truth come from Spirit;

if you commune with Him you receive His wisdom direct. So, read good

books rather than waste time on unproductive activities; but better still,

meditate and anchor your mind on the ultimate Truth, which is God.

Man’s Evolution Ordained by Cosmic Law

In different ages and places, man has developed, by his thought processes,

various ideas about life and the soul. For instance, when members of some

primitive tribes have headaches, they think their soul is lost, and they

appeal to the medicine man for healing. He goes out in the woods looking

for the lost soul, which he brings back in a box. Then he “replaces” the

“soul” in the patient’s head, and the headache is supposed to go away. It is

the custom in another culture, when anyone is sick, to put fishhooks into his

flesh so that if he happens to sneeze, his soul will not escape but will be

caught by the hooks.

As through the process of faulty thought some people have arrived at

erroneous conclusions about the soul, so by true reasoning others have

come to a more profound understanding. We know that the soul is not a puff

of breath, because there are persons who have lived long in the suspended-

animation state without breathing at all, showing that the soul cannot be

bound by breath.3 The soul is something beyond breath or any other

physical condition.

Whether or not one believes in himself as a soul, he is bound by the cosmic

law to develop, consciously or unconsciously, his deeper nature. Whatever a

person’s occupation in life, his consciousness is evolving whenever he is

planning something or otherwise using his intelligence creatively. Man

evolves through every constructive action he performs.

The trouble with most people is that when they are performing an action

they are thinking about something else. They don’t know how to

concentrate on what they are doing when they are doing it. You should learn

to think of one thing at a time with all the power of your mind. Your whole

attention should be there. Don’t drag along. Doing things in a lackadaisical

way leads to failure and misery.

Man should not be a psychological automaton, like the animal, which acts

only through instinct. To be unthinking is a great sin against Spirit, which

abides in you; we are meant to be conscious of what we do. We should

reflect before we act. We should learn how to use our minds so that we can

evolve and realize our oneness with the Creator. Everything we do should

be the result of premeditated thought.

Aim for high goals. It is a waste to use the power of thought to obtain things

that are not important. Learn to remove the weeds that have grown in the

garden of the mind. Make your mental garden so beautiful that God will

come there. If you want to have such a mental garden, blooming in the soil

of wisdom, you must make your life simple. By doing everything

consciously, not absentmindedly, you can analyze your activities; then

choose what is important and cut out the nonessentials. As soon as you are

through with your duties, withdraw your mind from them and employ it in

other creative pursuits.

God Fulfills Man’s Eternal Quest

Learn how to cultivate the consciousness of Spirit. That is why you were

born a human being. You were created under the evolutionary law that you

might exercise your divine powers to find God. The animal can’t find Him.

Lahiri Mahasaya was working on the science of helping animals to evolve

more quickly; but he didn’t live to finish this work. I, also, know of some

ways to quicken the evolution of the lower forms of life. But what of the

millions of human beings who are living like animals? When they leave this

world they haven’t fulfilled the purpose of their existence. Why not fulfill it

now? You can if you concentrate. The only meaning of life is to find the all-

loving God, who has kept us apart from Himself by shyly hiding from us.

We must find Him. Mankind is engaged in an eternal quest for that

“something else” he hopes will bring him happiness, complete and

unending. For those individual souls who have sought and found God, the

search is over: He is that Something Else.

Nature Veils God’s Presence

Why was temptation given to man? That he might look for the One who is

more tempting than any worldly temptation. The earthly lures that surround

you are not intended to ensnare you, but to cause you to seek beyond them;

to make you ask, “Who created all these things? Who made me? Who am I?

Where are You, Lord? Why are You hiding? Talk to me!” When you

directly approach God with these questions, He answers. Most people don’t

call deeply enough to Him, and so they never find Him. You must speak

clearly to Him in the language of your soul: “Lord, I want no longer to see

only the beauty You have created. I want to behold Your Face, which is

more beautiful than the flowers, more entrancing than all other faces. I want

to see Who is behind all nature.” Even if a person covers himself with a veil

you can see that someone is there. So is nature like a great veil bulging with

God’s presence. He is hiding there, but you take just a casual look, not

penetrating to see the shy Indweller. As I sit breathless, silent, watchful in

meditation, I become aware of a blissful trembling stir within me, and He

whispers: “I am here.”

The intelligence God has given us is the gateway to Heaven. It is the outer

door to His kingdom, but you don’t use it. Why not use it now, today?

Don’t wait, only to leave the earth like a dog, kicked out by death. It is a

crime against your soul. Your intelligence was given to you to discover why

you were placed here: to find Him.

How to Discover Spirit

There are various techniques for discovering the Spirit. Silence is one of

them. Practicing silence means to silence all desires that try to percolate

into your consciousness from outside, so you can go deeper within to feel

your soul.

Another step or technique is devotion, or speaking to God purely and

simply: “You have created me. I didn’t want to be created. It is Your

responsibility to reveal Yourself to me.” Talking to Him a little while and

then forgetting will never bring His response. God is “hard to get” because

not everyone “means business” with Him. The technique of prayer is

usually ineffectual because most prayers are not deep or devotional enough.

You have to repeat and repeat until you go really deep, into the

superconsciousness. Prayer in which your very soul is burning with desire

for God is the only effectual prayer. You have prayed like that at some time,

no doubt; perhaps when you wanted something very badly, or urgently

needed money—then you burned up the ether with your desire. That is how

you must feel for God. Talk to Him day and night; you will see that He will

respond.

Yoga Is the Science of Finding God

The Yoga system of contacting God is the best. It consists of various

scientifically effective techniques of meditation. The great sages of India

reasoned that logically there must be an exact law by which to approach

God, just as there are exact laws by which He operates His universes.

Through their experiments, the spiritual laws of yoga were discovered. The

science of yoga will take hold in this country more than any other form of

spiritual seeking. The entire trend will be away from churches, where

people go only to hear a sermon, and into schools and quiet places where

they will go to meditate and really find God.

Everyone should practice divine communion with God. This is what Jesus

did when he was with his disciples. I am not here just to tell you about the

sugar of God’s presence; my greatest aim is to make sure you taste it. What

is the use of my talking about God unless you know Him and taste His

sweetness? You must realize God, as I have realized Him.

It is not out of pride that I speak this way, but because I am sent here to

testify to you about Him. Day and night I think about my Lord. I am not

wasting my time. Everything I do I am doing only for Him, so engrossed

that I don’t notice the passage of time or feel fatigue from my daily

activities. I feel His presence when I work. That is also my meditation. I

often give this illustration: Some worldly men remain drunk for years by

hiding now and then to take a little drink to sustain the euphoric feeling;

then they go back to their work. So is the divine man; he hides from people

and meditates upon the Lord. Drinking deep of the intoxicating wine of

God’s presence, he whispers, “Lord, You are so wonderful, so marvelous! I

love You.” Then he goes back to his duties. Inwardly he talks to God all the

time, no matter what he is doing.

I am never separated from Him for a second. That is the state I wanted and

worked for. I remember that once in a while I used to feel that He had gone

away from me, and at such times I wanted to die rather than live without

Him. I didn’t find happiness in anything. Thus does the lover of God suffer

when separated from Him. But a time comes when the devotee beholds the

Lord dancing everywhere, and feels the immortal fountain of His spirit and

His bliss ever bubbling in his soul. This is what you will feel if you

meditate. Pray with such intensity that He will come to you. In the Gita is a

beautiful promise from the Lord: “Immerse thy mind in Me alone;

concentrate on Me thy discriminative perception; and beyond doubt thou

shalt dwell immortally in Me.”4

The yoga techniques are more scientific than prayer; that is why they lead

more swiftly to divine communion. In my youth, when I sought Him with

prayer alone, it often took a long time to get results. After I had learned

Kriya Yoga and practiced it, with deep devotion, I achieved results in a few

minutes. Krishna taught that yoga meditation is greater than the path of

asceticism, the path of devotion or prayer, the path of right action, or the

path of discrimination.5 It is a faster way. An airplane will take you from

Los Angeles to New York in a matter of hours; by bullock cart the journey

would last several months. If you practice yoga, you will find it to be the

airplane of spiritual progress.

After you have perfected yourself in the Yoga path, which embraces bodily

discipline, mental discipline, and spiritual discipline, the obstacles to

spiritual success are overcome and you can commune freely with God. That

is why it is the highest path. And that is why I am trying to acquaint people

with it. Yoga is not a myth, a creation of someone’s imagination. It is a true

science.

Why shouldn’t you take from India the greatest methods for finding God

that have ever been given to mankind? I went to the masters in India for

training, and they taught me about Christ in a profound and loving way

such as never I heard in the West. I saw Christ in their company. They

talked with him. Did St. Francis lie to us? He saw Christ every night. Lord

Jesus lives! I have seen him. When you are behind a screen you see

everyone else outside, but they can’t see you. So the saints and the angels

can see you, but you can’t see them unless you practice yoga.6

Your Prayer Must Be Intense to Reach God

Last summer I stopped at a monastery where I met one of the priests. He

was a wonderful soul. I asked him how long he had been on the spiritual

path as a monk.

“About twenty-five years,” he replied. Then I asked:

“Do you see Christ?”

“I don’t deserve it,” he answered. “Maybe after death he will visit me.”

“No,” I assured him, “you can see him from tonight if you make up your

mind.” Tears were in his eyes, and he remained silent.

You must pray intensely. If you sit night after night practicing meditation

and crying to God, the darkness will be burned up, and you will see the

Light behind this physical light, the Life behind all life, the Father behind

all fathers, the Mother behind all mothers, the Friend behind all friends, the

Element behind all elements, the Power behind all powers. That is where I

live, and where I want you to come.

Practice of Yoga Awakens Soul Longing

You have gone away from God like the prodigal son, and it is only by

returning to Him, within, that you will make this vale of tears a haven of

heaven. There is no other way. If everyone in this world were a millionaire

there would still be troubles and sorrows, for you cannot buy unshakable

happiness. That comes only by following a technique of yoga, and by

devotion, by going within. Practicing yoga is half the battle. Even if you

don’t feel enthusiastic in the beginning, if you go on practicing you will

come to feel that tremendous longing for God which is necessary if you are

to find Him.

Why don’t you make the effort? Whence do all the beautiful things in

creation continually emerge? Whence comes the intelligence of great souls,

but from the storehouse of the Infinite Spirit? And if these wonders you see

about you are not enough to induce you to seek Him, why should He reveal

Himself to you? He has given you the capacity for love that you may yearn

for Him above all else. Don’t misuse your love and reason. And don’t

misuse your concentration and intelligence on false goals.

This World Is Only Pictures of Light

Night is the time for meditation; never go to bed until you have

communion. I never do. Last night as I sat on my bed His presence engulfed

me. The whole room and everything in it was blinding Light. Even when I

slept I remained locked in the arms of the Divine. Never have I felt such

joy.

This world is all a motion-picture projection of God’s mind. There is no

death, no disease, no wickedness. Someday, when He will show you His

Light transforming itself into this terrible cosmic motion picture of life and

death, and then withdraw the picture so that only His Light remains, you

can laugh at the unreality of His light-and-shadow creation. You will know

then that He has created everything out of His Light; and that only the Light

is real. We must fully shake ourselves out of this dream delusion to realize

that we are rays of that immortal Light. This realization comes with the

practice of the highest yoga technique of meditation. It cannot be conveyed

in lectures.

God Is Our Only True Goal

Every now and then I receive a letter from the Self-Realization students in

London. During these terrible air raids they have not missed one Self-

Realization Fellowship service. That is the real spirit of England and that is

the spirit that will save England. Politicians can never save the world; it is

only understanding God that will save the world. He is our true goal in this

life. Otherwise there would be no incentive for going on.

Those who love God should worship Him in all religions. “In whatever way

people are devoted to Me, in that measure (according to their desire, their

degree of understanding, and their manner of worship) I manifest Myself to

them. All men, regardless of their mode of seeking, pursue a path to Me.”7

Criticize no one’s faith. There should be a genuine feeling of love and

respect for all. Wherever you see a temple or church you should inwardly

bow down to the Spirit there. It is not for everyone to be a teacher, but you

can always draw the attention of others to spiritual things. Don’t waste your

time, spending hours listening to the radio and reading useless novels. Be

entertained by the divine messages coming from your own soul. Just by a

gentle attuning touch of my love, I hear His program here in my heart.

No one can bring you salvation unless you earn it—not through belief, not

through following dogma, but by your own knowledge and experience. You

should ask yourself these questions every day: If there is a God, why don’t I

see Him? If there are saints, where are they? The answers will be given you;

you can commune with God and His saints if you practice the science of

Kriya Yoga. My sole desire is to give you the Truth, that you may

experience what I experience.

The purpose of this life is to find your Self. Know your Self. Feel the throb

of the ocean of God’s presence in your heart. Suppose you are floating in

the ocean, rocked on the bosom of its mighty vastness, and when you swim

ashore, you still feel the whole ocean, surging behind you as you walk onto

the beach—this is the way I feel God. He never leaves any of His children

for a moment. He will reply to all your questions, and then there will be no

more fears.

Find that Power, feel the ocean of His love behind your consciousness, and

you will achieve the greatest success man can attain.

1 Colorful gardens surrounded the first Self-Realization Fellowship Golden

Lotus Temple in Encinitas.

2 Through the “single eye” within the center of the forehead, man can

behold the inner astral and causal worlds behind the gross physical cosmos.

3 See feat of Sadhu Haridas.

4 Bhagavad Gita XII:8.

5 Bhagavad Gita VI:46.

6 There have been mystics of various faiths who, through their transcendent

powers of devotion to God, have attained to the breathless state of

superconsciousness ecstasy that alone brings true inner vision. The spiritual

fervor of such great souls is beyond the emotional scope of the average

person. For mankind as a whole, the only hope of divine illumination lies in

the yogic approach to God through daily practice of scientific spiritual

methods.

7 Bhagavad Gita IV:11.

The Art of Living

1933

Every man builds his aspirations and forms his desires according to prenatal

and postnatal influences. Heredity, and national, social, and family

characteristics, tastes, and habits mold each human life. But in the

beginning of life, children are about the same everywhere. Jesus said:

“Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is

the kingdom of God.”1 Divinity is the one nationality of all children the

world over; but as they grow older, and family and social characteristics

begin to exercise their influence, children begin to manifest national and

racial traits.

God has expressed His truth in varying combinations within particular

civilizations, nationalities, and individual mentalities. Through this

diversity He has placed before us a kaleidoscopic image of man’s potential.

It is man’s duty to glean from this variety the qualities that are highest and

best; and to foster them within himself, his nation, and the world. Great

men and saints do this. They live several hundred years ahead of their time

in exemplifying universal principles of truth that are eternal. These

principles are the essence of the true art of living, and are applicable and

vital to the success and happiness of all men. The differences among

peoples of the various nations, races, and creeds should create, not a

division, but a basis of comparison for selection of the best qualities and

methods with which to develop the ideal man and the ideal world.

Of all the nations at present, India and America represent, respectively, the

acme of spiritually and materially efficient civilizations. India and other

Oriental nations have produced the highest types of spiritual people, such as

Jesus and Gandhi; whereas America has produced the greatest types of

businessmen and practical scientists, such as Henry Ford and Thomas

Edison. A combination of spiritually efficient qualities with materially

efficient qualities, as represented in the foregoing life-examples of great

men, can offer us an art of living that will produce in every nationality all-

round men of the highest type—physically, mentally, morally, materially,

socially, and spiritually.

It is important to select, not one-sided national characteristics, but all-round

universal principles of living from all nations and from all great men. Do

not take only those principles that develop the physical at the cost of the

spiritual phase of man’s life, or vice versa; adopt those principles that

develop equally and harmoniously the superman of balanced physical,

mental, moral, and spiritual qualities.

Practical Methods for Uniform Development

Following are a few practical methods for uniformly developing body,

mind, and soul:

• Include in your daily diet milk and other dairy products, and a good

percentage of raw food and fresh fruits; drink a large glass of orange juice

with finely ground nuts mixed in. Eat less meat; avoid beef and pork

entirely. Read and follow a reliable modern book on dietetics.

• Fast one day a week on orange juice and use a suitable natural laxative as

prescribed by your physician.

• Every morning and evening, with deep attention, walk briskly, run, or take

some other form of exercise—as vigorous as your constitution allows—

until you perspire.

• Read and meditate on some inspiring passage from the Bible and from the

Bhagavad Gita.

• Read Shakespeare and other classics, and suitable portions from practical

books on such subjects as chemistry, physics, physiology, history of

Oriental and Western philosophy, comparative religion, ethics, and

psychology. Don’t waste your time on cheap writings. Read a dependable

health periodical and an inspiring spiritual magazine. Include editorials and

health articles when reading newspapers, not just the comics and scandals.

• Visit different temples and churches—Protestant, Catholic, Buddhist,

Jewish, Hindu, and so on—to develop your appreciation and understanding

of all faiths. Look upon each one as The Temple of Our God.

• Honor God not only in man-made temples, but learn to worship and

commune with Him in the inner temple of silence. Practice meditation for

one hour in the morning and one hour at night, following the scientific

methods taught by the great masters of Self-Realization Fellowship. Do not

be sidetracked into forests of blind, untested belief and theology; get on the

one highway of Self-realization that leads quickly to God.

• Do not be enslaved by the senses. They are not meant to bind you with

material desires, but to serve you with perceptions of good, which reflect

God.

• See plays or motion pictures only occasionally, choosing those of the

highest quality.

• Obey God’s divine laws as applied to family, country, and all nations.

• Speak truth with kindness and understanding, and respect truth wherever

you perceive it.

• Expand your love for family and country to include love and service to

people of all nations. See God in all men of whatever race or religion.

• Spend less, and have more, by doing away with luxurious habits. From

your earnings put aside as much as possible, so that you can live partially

on the interest from your savings, without having to dip into the capital.

• See life as divided into four periods, during each of which the main focus

should be on developing efficiency in the activities appropriate to that part

of life.2

(1) From age 5 to 25 years. The child should receive concentrated character

training and become instilled with spiritual ideals and habits. As he grows

into adulthood, he should get a general education, learn efficiency by study

and observation, and seek specialized training in some work to which he

feels suited.

(2) From age 25 to 40 years. As an adult, one should fulfill family and other

obligations to this world, while striving to keep a spiritual balance.

(3) From age 40 to 50 years. During this period, adults should live more

quietly, studying inspirational writings and keeping abreast of progress in

the arts and sciences, and spending more time in meditation.

(4) From age 50 on. One should spend the last part of life in meditating

deeply most of the time; and, through the wisdom and spirituality thus

acquired, in rendering social and spiritual service to others.

Be Calmly Active and Actively Calm

In short, don’t think all the time of just making money. Exercise, read,

meditate, love God, and act peacefully at all times. Learn to be calmly

active and actively calm, carrying into your daily activities the calmness

gained in the spiritual activity of meditation. In the Gita, Bhagavan Krishna

teaches: “Remaining immersed in yoga, perform all actions, forsaking

attachment (to their fruits), being indifferent to success and failure. This

mental evenness is termed yoga.”3

Please join me in this prayer for true brotherhood under the Fatherhood of

God:

“Heavenly Father, help us to create a ‘United States of the World,’ with Thy

Truth our leader and president, which will guide us to live in loving

brotherhood, and urge us to develop our bodies, minds, and souls perfectly,

that Thy Kingdom of Heavenly Peace, which is within us, may be manifest

in the actions of our daily life.

“Make us healthy, efficient, perfect in every way, so that we may inspire all

our earthly brothers to manifest their true nature as Thy noble children.

“Heavenly Father, may Thy love shine forever on the sanctuary of our

devotion, and may we be able to awaken Thy love in all hearts.”

If you contact and commune with God in the inner temple of silence, you

will have mastered the true art of living. Then health, prosperity, wisdom,

love, and joy will be added unto you.

1 Luke 18:16.

2 This is a general application of the ancient Vedic ideal of dividing man’s

life into four stages, known as the four ashramas. (1) Physical, mental,

moral, and spiritual education of the celibate student (Brahmacharya). (2)

Fulfillment of householder or worldly responsibilities (Grihastha). (3)

Retirement from the world to seclusion or an ashram to devote more time to

spiritual pursuits and thinking of God (Vanaprastha). (4) Complete outer as

well as inner renunciation of all ties to the world (Sannyas). Though

complete renunciation was generally the fourth ashrama, it was not

confined to that stage, but was advocated earlier in life for one who felt the

supreme desire for God alone.

By following the four ashramas, man was taught the art of living and right

behavior; given an opportunity to fulfill his material ambitions and

responsibilities; allowed a time to contemplate his spiritual life and make a

greater effort for Self-realization; and then encouraged to give his life, his

all, back to God, from whom all gifts of life, and life itself, have come.

3 Bhagavad Gita II:48.

Habit—Your Master or Your Slave?

Date and place unknown

The human brain, with its hilly ranges of cerebral convolutions inlaid with

arterial streamlets and dark rivers of veins, presents an epitome of a huge

estate. Is this exquisite territory devoid of a Divine Resident? Could there

be a book without an author, a child without parents, a clock without a

maker, a rose without a designer? Nay! Similarly, the cerebral domain of

mystic beauty has been shaped by wondrous intelligent agencies.

Who lives in this marvelous hall whose walls of mortared osseous tissues

are fitted with ocular, tactual, auditory, olfactory, and gustatory doors?

Beneath the dome of the human skull a colony of myriads of cells pulsating

with life and intelligence are playing out scenes of intense activity. Tiny

brain cells are engaged in diverse pursuits—banqueting, introspecting, and

receiving guests of sensations that enter from the outer sensory doors. There

is buying and selling going on: processes of absorption and elimination.

Like tiny boats, blood corpuscles paddle along arterial streams, laden with

various vital commodities.

Guiding and controlling many of these cellular activities is an unseen band

of impish pixies and good fairies—habits. Sometimes great mischief is

created when foreign and lawless habits are permitted entry into the cranial

commonwealth. They set themselves up as lords, dominating the activities

of their hosts, the brain cells. When the latter attempt to resist this

encroachment on their freedom, these United States of Flesh become a

scene of civil war. The whole bodily country is thrown into disorder while

the brain cells furiously debate the right of certain habits to act as petty

dictators.

How do habits gain power to tyrannize over human conduct? Every human

activity, whether it be performed as an outward physical movement or as an

inner process of thought, is a vote for a particular habit. Repetition of that

action or thought swells the number of votes in favor of electing that habit

to a seat in the bodily government. A considerable number of such actions

vote that habit into office. At different periods of life a collective vote of all

previous human actions determines which habits are going to predominate

and rule supreme.

An election by numerical superiority alone, without adherence to a

desirable qualitative standard, may bring disaster upon a country. If the

majority of voters are morons or criminals, they are bound to blunder and

elect the wrong president. Similarly, unless the votes of human actions are

cast according to the supreme law of discrimination, the brain cells may

thoughtlessly enslave themselves under tyrannical habit-dictators.

Maintenance of a truly enlightened spiritual democracy in the bodily

country requires a thorough education of the brain-cell citizenry. The latter

should be trained not to permit habit-candidates to be elected merely on the

numerical strength of thoughtlessly repeated actions, but should consciously

exercise the qualitative power of discriminative attention with the casting of

every action-vote. They should be guided by ideal rationalism, and heed its

warnings against accepting the bribe of sentimental attachment to

environment, which leads to the misuse of voting power. Discriminative

reason should be the sole guide in selection of the presidential habit-

candidates.

Are Habit Slaves Born or Made?

Habits of drinking, excessive smoking, overindulgence in coffee or tea; and

habitual moods of anger, greed, envy, sloth, and despondency are usually

elected to office by the cumulative numerical strength of unwise hordes of

little actions performed without any thought of the aftereffect of

enslavement. Persons addicted to such habits are not born ineluctably to

their unfortunate fate; in this or in a past life, knowingly or unknowingly,

they have enslaved themselves through constant repetition of certain

actions. The first drink never made a drunkard; the first act of sensuality

never made a libertine; the first use of narcotics never made a dope addict.

It was a series of mechanical or ill-considered repetitions of such misguided

actions that elected these gripping habits to power.1 Quantitative strength

won against the qualitative voice of attentive reason, which had become

weakened through failure to exercise its powers, and had thus lost its vote.

Guard yourself, therefore, against the first performance of a wrong act.

What you do once you are likely to do again. It is by repetition that a habit

grows stronger and bigger, like a rolling snowball. Use your reason in all

your actions; otherwise you may thoughtlessly convert yourself into a

helpless slave of undesirable habits.

Impeach a Bad Habit-President and Install a Good One

A strong bad habit presiding for a long time over the bodily country brings

chaos and misery. Spiritual famine, mental fevers, and a universal poverty

of body and mind exist in that misruled land. A strong bad habit should be

impeached before a tribunal of daily introspection under the presiding judge

of conscience, who should inform the court of reason that the inevitable

outcome of persistence in the offending actions will be an impaired nervous

system, wasted powers, and vanished happiness. This constantly sounded

note of warning may serve gradually to persuade the jury of reason to the

decision to put away forever the guilty victimizing habit.

Sometimes it is difficult to convince the court. Many persons who

excessively smoke, drink, or indulge in sex experiences do not seek or even

wish to be free of these slavish compulsions. They delusively think that

there is nothing harmful about what they are doing because they don’t

immediately suffer disillusioning painful consequences. Childlike, they fail

to visualize the ultimate results of their actions. They do not see that they

have set into motion laws that work impartially for good or ill, according to

the nature of human actions; that, although the shovels of harmful habits dig

slowly, they yet dig surely a yawning, untimely grave, a pit of misery

toward which the slave of wrong habits proceeds through scorching flames

of suffering. Of such entrapped persons the Gita says: “Harboring

bewildering thoughts, caught in the net of delusion, craving only sensual

delights, they sink into a foul hell.”2

First convince your mind that you are going to overthrow the tyranny of the

undesirable ruling habit; then begin the work of constitutional agitation and

actual impeachment. A whining or sorrowing attitude, gentle remonstrance,

or even violent but spasmodic rebellion is of little avail. It is through

continuous repetition of certain actions that you are the maker of your

habits; and you must undo hurtful ones by a similarly regular effort,

implemented by conscious exercise of will and the discriminative power of

reason.

Relate your actions to new and better habits. Keep them continuously busy,

interested, and attentive in serving good habits and in fraternizing with

other good actions. If your actions begin to revert to their old dangerous

habit-influenced associations, don’t become discouraged. Persist in right

actions, give them sufficient time and attention, and the voting strength of

the new good actions will increase and finally become powerful enough to

overthrow the worthless habit and to elect in its place a worthy one.

It Takes Time to Establish Habits, Good or Bad

It takes time for even a bad habit to attain supremacy, so why be impatient

about the growth of a rival good habit? Do not despair about your

undesirable habits; simply stop feeding them and thus making them strong

by repetition. The time that elapses in the formation of habits varies with

individual nervous systems and brains and is chiefly determined by the

quality of one’s attention. Through the power of deep, concentration-trained

attention, any habit may be installed—that is, new patterns may be made in

the brain—almost instantaneously and at will. The potency of concentration

and will to create good and bad fortune is strikingly summed up in the

Biblical verse: “For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and he shall

have more abundance; but whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken

away even that he hath.”3 This truth is particularly applicable to habits. A

man of good actions strengthens his will to perform further good actions,

and thus increases in virtue with little effort. But a slave of bad habits

debauches his will and reason, so that eventually he is not only powerless to

create new good habits, but also has weakened his hold on whatever good

habits he may have had at the start.

Government of one’s actions by intuitional, wisdom-guided discrimination,

uninfluenced by either good or bad habits, imparts unbounded power of

will. “But that man succeeds supremely, O Arjuna, who, disciplining the

senses by the mind, unattached, keeps his organs of activity steadfast on the

path of God-uniting actions.”4 A man with such power can instantly fix a

new habit in his brain, or stop one at will. An ideal democracy presupposes

rational, willing obedience to good laws, without any goading by higher

authority or other external influences. Similarly a wise man, one who is

really free, avoids error and performs good, not from the compulsion of

habit but from free and reasoned choice. Such a one does not permit himself

to be dominated by even a good habit, lest in so doing he fail to exercise

full discriminative choice of action. A good habit may be in force simply

because there has never been any temptation of evil to overthrow it. A good

habit thus established is not necessarily fixed permanently in the nature,

because it has been maintained not from discriminative choice and reason

but as a result of favoring circumstance.

All national tastes and human customs are habits, circumstantially acquired

as a result of environmental influence. Love of Americanism or of

Hinduism is the outcome of habit and familiarity. If I had had the choice, I

would have preferred to be a human “chameleon,” free to embrace the

desirable aspects of all nationalities and all creeds.

We can test our power over our habits by commanding the mind to like or

dislike a certain food at will. On one occasion I found this particular test

useful: Shortly after I had come to America, I attended a dinner at which

Roquefort cheese and crackers were served. No sooner had Mr. Roquefort

touched the palate, and no sooner had his arrival become known to the

cerebral cells, than the habit-lords of taste instituted a rebellion among the

honored guests already gathered in my stomach, who became very upset

and began to threaten, “If you let Mr. Roquefort in, we will all leave in a

body!” I did not enjoy this sudden embarrassment! Noticing that everyone

else at the table was greatly relishing the peculiar food, I strongly urged my

senses to elect immediately the Roquefort cheese-enjoying habit. Then I

liked the taste at once, and have continued to like it from that time on.

Why is it that you sometimes find yourself acting, or reacting, contrary to

your real desires? Because over a period of time you have built up habits

that are contrary to those desires, and your actions automatically flatter your

habits. You must first establish habits that will influence your actions to

cater to your true ideals.

Habit is an automatic mechanism for performing actions without expending

the mental and physical labor ordinarily involved in performing actions that

are new to us. Wrongly used, this mechanism is an archenemy, threatening

man’s citadel of free choice. Be practical. Try from today to overcome

inimical habits hidden within you, garbed as environmental likes and

dislikes. Oust them and be free to act from reason alone. Your habits are not

you. Shake off that delusion and you will remember your true Self, the

perfect image of God within you.

1 For people who have established in previous lives the pattern of a harmful

habit, such as alcoholism, the “first drink” was taken many lives ago; that is

why in this life even the first drink can revive that habit with alarming

suddenness and often tragic consequences.

2 Bhagavad Gita XVI:16.

3 Matthew 13:12.

4 Bhagavad Gita III:7. (See Karma Yoga in glossary.)

Creating and Destroying Habits at Will

Self-Realization Fellowship Temple, San Diego, California, December 12,

1943

Many are the favors that God does for His children. Sometimes He grants a

wish immediately. When I asked if the rain might be stopped for the

services today, the Voice of the Divine Mother said: “There will be a little

sunshine.” It is because of the kindness of the Holy Spirit that we have

sunshine this morning.

The Lord is the Mother of all mothers, the Father of all fathers, the One

Friend behind all friends. If you always think of Him as the nearest of the

near, you will witness many wonders in your life. “He walks with me and

He talks with me and He tells me I am His own.”1 And God will talk with

you, also, if by meditation you make definite inroads “with unperturbèd

pace” into the divine realm.

The poet Francis Thompson spoke of God as the “Hound of Heaven”: God

is depicted as pursuing man, rather than as being sought by him. Man,

hiding in labyrinthine caves of doubts, escapes from God; still the Divine

Hound keeps coming, and warning: “All things betray thee, who betrayest

Me.”

If you so live that you drive God away, you drive love itself away from you.

In everything we are seeking—money and sense pleasures—we are actually

seeking God. We are searchers for diamonds who pick up instead little

pieces of glass shining with the sunlight. Momentarily blinded by their

attractiveness, we forget to keep on looking for the real diamonds, which

are much harder to find.

Although more difficult to obtain, your good habits are the diamonds that

will give you true and lasting pleasure. And bad habits are the pieces of

mere glass that seem to satisfy you, because they are more easily come by;

but which, being delusory, will in the end bring disappointment. Satiety will

overtake you, so that nothing gives you pleasure. I do not have to go

through those experiences; I can see the end of human pleasures, and I have

found in God the only real and lasting joy.

The real definition of “old age” is that state wherein one has become bored

with the world. I tired of the pleasures of life very quickly;2 and this world

would have been extremely boresome to me had I not sought and found the

joy of God. The happiness and abundance I find in Him are measureless.

Eternity is not long enough for me to explain the joy of the devotee’s heart

when God enters. This is not exaggeration, because God’s joy is eternal—

unceasing, ever new, boundless. All of us have glimpses of it now and then

—soul recollections of a state of eternal happiness.

In this world everybody wants to use us for his own purpose. Only God—

and a real master who knows God—can truly love us. The ordinary human

being does not know what love is. When someone’s company gives you

pleasure, you tend to think you love that person. But in reality it is yourself

you love; your ego has been pleased by the other person’s attention, that is

all. Would you go on “loving” that person if he should cease to please you?

What it means to love someone else more than oneself is very difficult to

understand, and even more difficult for the average person to practice. To

illustrate, I will tell you a true story of real love.

There was in India a devoted husband who loved his wife very deeply.

Another man became infatuated with her. She ran away with her lover, who

eventually left her without friends or funds. One day her husband came to

see her. He spoke gently.

“Are you through with this experience? Come home with me, if you are.”

She demurred. “I could not think of disgracing you further.”

“What do I care about the opinion of society?” he replied. “I love you. The

other man loved only your body. I love the real you—your soul. What has

happened doesn’t make any difference.”

That was real love. The husband wasn’t concerned for his honor; he was

thinking only of the welfare of his beloved.

One great stumbling-block in the way of giving true love is our habits. In

our hearts we all want to be angels, but our habits make us devils. In the

morning we make up our minds to adhere to good, but during the day we

forget our resolution. “The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.”3

Flesh means habits. Our spirit, our wisdom, is willing; but our good habits

are weak. The Gita says, “The eager excitable senses do forcibly seize the

consciousness even of one who has a high degree of enlightenment, and is

striving (for liberation).”4

Many people don’t understand the terrible nature of habit. Some persons

form habits very quickly. This is all right when establishing good habits; but

it is dangerous when performing actions that may create bad habits. If you

give such a person one cigarette, he may become a habitual smoker. Or a

taste of one drink may make him a lifelong drinker.5

Since you do not know what type of subconscious mind you have, or what

your hidden tendencies may be, it is best to avoid actions that may lead to

harmful habits. If the mind is not strong in wisdom and discrimination, it

acts like a blotting paper, absorbing bad habits quickly.

So many people need help in this world! And God does help them, through

those who are willing instruments of His love. The other day a pitiable case

came to me. This person, when not drinking, is a good man; but as soon as

he starts drinking he becomes a fiend. He would go to extremes to do good

when he is sober; but when drunk he beats his wife and causes terror. He

has come for healing, and I know that if he tunes in just a little bit he will be

helped. But see how terrible evil habits are! When this man is not under the

influence of liquor, you wouldn’t be able to see a trace of evil in him; and at

such times he is so filled with remorse about his evil habit of drinking that

he wants to destroy himself. But still he drinks! That is what habit does.

If you make up your mind to do something good you must do it. Don’t let

anything stand in your way. But before you make a resolution, determine

that it is a good one. When I make up my mind I absolutely do not listen to

any contradictions. I sometimes take a long time to make my decision, but

when I do, nothing can stop me. A law of God operates for you when you

strongly make up your mind and then adhere firmly to that resolution.

All of us mean well; but habits sometimes make us do things, against our

will, that are harmful to others and to ourselves. Therefore, make up your

mind not to be imposed upon by bad habits.

Why Let Your Habits Dictate to You?

Your forefathers came here to escape from rules that took away freedom to

act according to one’s conscience. Freeborn Americans don’t like to have

anyone dictate to them. Why then should you let yourself be dictated to by

your habits? Such as when you don’t want to eat, and still you eat; or when

you don’t want to fight with others, yet you do. What is the matter? You

have allowed yourself to become a slave to bad habits.

Just being born in America or in other democratic lands does not guarantee

freedom of the mind and heart. To be free is to be able to perform right

actions according to the dictates of one’s own soul wisdom, not out of

compulsion of habit, or blind obedience, or unreasoning fear. Wisdom

confers true freedom, and that is the real spirit of America.

Doing whatever you please is not freedom; it is an abuse of freedom.

Suppose you live in a house with twenty other people, each of whom

regards freedom as the right to do what he pleases, and each of whom wants

to do something that conflicts with the desires of the others? There can be

no real freedom under such circumstances. Freedom comes only by

following the law of self-government. To do freely what you ought to do,

when you ought to do it—to be guided by your wisdom—is the only real

freedom.

Slavery to habits is slavery in its worst form. Resolve to be free. Awaken

the divine memory of your soul’s freedom by affirming: “Even though I

have had some bad habits since childhood, I can discard them by exercise

of my wisdom and will. I am master of my own body-house.”

Be Guided by Wisdom, Not Convention

What makes one person act differently from another? Habits of living and

doing and thinking; habits of environment and of nationality. In the latter

case, habits are imposed upon us. I follow my own ways. When I started for

America in 1920, I had a long beard. You would think that men with beards

would appear more venerable; and in India beards are admired for this

reason. But while still aboard ship, I was persuaded that Americans, on

seeing a man with a long beard, would be more inclined to remark, “There

goes a wild man from the jungle!”

After I understood that few American men wear a beard, I was willing to

abandon mine; but I resolved to keep my hair long, because my guru, Sri

Yukteswarji, wore his hair long. So no one was able to influence me to cut

my hair short. If I were to cut off my long hair now, the same people who

ridiculed its length years ago would laugh at me for having short hair, and

would feel that the stature of the inner man also had been shortened.

We don’t really know what is right or real, because we are always

comparing things on the basis of outer appearances. Therefore we are often

incorrect in our judgments. Who is able to say what is right and what is

wrong, merely on a basis of appearances?

You should make an effort gradually to free yourself from slavery to any

habit, be it of dress or food or anything else. Many people feel they have to

eat meat three times a day. Others are convinced they should eat nothing but

lettuce and nuts; that if they vary their diet they will become ill! Such

beliefs are a form of slavery. You should not permit yourself to be bound by

any habit of living; be able, rather, to change your habits as wisdom

dictates. Learn to live rightly, using your power of free choice, guided by

wisdom. Be able to sleep comfortably on a soft bed one night and just as

comfortably on the floor the next night. That divine nonattachment to habit

is the freedom advocated by the masters of India.

True Freedom Versus Whim Freedom

In the West many people believe in freedom of a different kind—I call it

whim freedom. Because of a mistaken conception of the real nature of

freedom, some parents make their children habit-slaves for life by

indiscriminately giving in to their desires. The child grows up thinking that

so long as his desires are satisfied he will be happy; and that the purpose of

life is to satisfy desires. Later he realizes that he has been misled; the world

outside is much different from what he has seen at home. To satisfy every

whim is not so easy in the world! Others may push him around in order to

gain their own ends; and he too becomes callous in order to satisfy his

whims and desires. “Believing that fulfillment of bodily desires is man’s

highest aim, confident that this world is ‘all,’ such persons are engrossed till

the moment of death in earthly cares and concerns.”6

Parents should try to equip their children with firm will and discrimination,

so that they can make their way in the world and still remain apart from its

bad habits. Teach children how to be really free. Don’t let them become

slaves to the body and to undesirable habits. It is good to train a child in

regularity of daily habits, but he should be trained also in evenmindedness:

if he gets to sleep on time, all right; if not, all right. If he has his dinner on

time, fine; if he cannot eat on time, fine. Children should be taught to

respect the rights of others; but to be free of habit slavery to anything or

anyone.

Fight Bad Habits With “Won’t” Power

When a mule wants to be agreeable, it is quite obedient, but when it makes

up its mind to stop cooperating, nobody can move it. You should develop

that kind of won’t power. Be master of your moods and habits. Then when

you make up your mind not to do something that is wrong, nobody can

make you do it against your will. In other situations, however, should you

find yourself to be mistaken, be able quickly to change your mind. This

flexibility comes when you do not permit yourself to be governed by habit,

but act instead by wisdom-guided free will. Be free! Don’t be a slave even

of good habits; do right for its own sake.

Some people have to be told every day what to do, even though their duties

may be substantially the same; but ordinarily people perform routine daily

activities as a matter of habit. This is fine if they have cultivated good

habits; but it is unfortunate for those who have adopted bad habits. Most

people possess a combination of both.

Habits Are Mental Phonograph Records

Repeated performance of an action creates a mental blueprint. Every action

is performed mentally as well as physically, and repetition of a particular

action and its accompanying thought-pattern causes the formation of subtle

electrical pathways in the physiological brain, somewhat like the grooves in

a phonograph record. After a time, whenever you put the needle of attention

on those “grooves” of electrical pathways, it plays back the “record” of the

original mental blueprint. Each time an action is repeated, these grooves of

electrical pathways become deeper, until the slightest attention

automatically “plays” those same actions over and over again.

Yet by concentration and will power you can erase even deep grooves of

long-standing habits. If you are addicted to smoking, for example, say to

yourself: “The habit of smoking has long been lodged in my brain. Now I

put all my attention and concentration on my brain and I will that habit to

be dislodged.” Command your mind thus, again and again. The best time of

the day to do this is in the morning, when the will and attention are fresh.

Repeatedly affirm your freedom, using all the strength of your will power.

One day you will suddenly feel that you no longer are ensnared by that

habit.

I know a man who wanted to get rid of the smoking habit. He was a chain

smoker, but he had great faith that he could overcome the habit. I told him:

“After I have given you a healing I want you to smoke. It will taste just like

a bundle of rags and you will not enjoy smoking anymore.” And this was

so. When he tried to smoke the next day he became nauseated. He had been

receptive to my strong thought, and I had momentarily been able to transmit

my consciousness to him. After that he was freed from this bad habit.

Biting the nails is another foolish, useless habit. Why should you do such

things against your will when you are the king of the castle of your life?

Maintain Your Freedom as a Child of God

If your mind is strong, and if you surrender yourself to God and forget the

body, you will be able to maintain your freedom as a child of God. Make up

your mind that no habit has a permanent hold on you. If your wisdom is

strong, you can convince yourself in a second what you should do. Awaken

that wisdom which revives in you the power of free will, enabling you to

rise above the compulsive instinct of ordinary habits. “Even if thou art the

chief sinner among all sinners, yet by the sole raft of wisdom thou shalt

safely cross the sea of sin.”7

The best way to get rid of habits is to will them out of your mind at once!

Do not linger over them, lest your resolve weaken. Wisdom is your

salvation from habits. If one tells a little boy not to eat candies, he will want

them more than ever. Suppose that when he grows up he has diabetes, and

his doctor tells him he will die if he eats more candy. It is wisdom then that

tells him the doctor is right, and that encourages him quickly to give up the

candy habit of many years. Through wisdom man learns—sometimes!

I remember in my school in Ranchi, India, a boy who liked to do just the

opposite of what he was told to do. Therefore I often told him to do what I

didn’t want him to do, and in that way got him to do what I wanted. In time

he “got wise,” in a double sense, and changed himself for the better.

This is my message to all who suffer from slavery to habit: turn against

those slave-driving habits that have been telling you what to do, and say, “I

have a whip with which I will make you get out. You cannot make me do

things against my will any longer. I am a freeborn child of God. I am made

in His image. I will use my divinely bestowed wisdom and free will to do

the right thing that I should do in everything.”

Many times I have used the divine power of will to destroy a habit that was

seeking to get hold of me. When I have eaten certain foods and found

myself becoming bound by a wish for them, I stopped eating those foods

until the desire was gone.

When I went to Singapore I found there a certain fruit that is delicious; but I

watched myself that I didn’t form a craving for it. I knew that if I did not

take care I could find myself wanting it morning, noon, and night. That is

the way we enslave ourselves. So although I had full enjoyment of the fruit

that one day, I didn’t regret its absence on the next day. If we are watchful

of the things we enjoy, there is no need to fear. We should keep our freedom

at all costs.

So many people go on eating foods that they know are not good for them.

But if I say I won’t eat a food, that is the end of it. Isn’t that freedom? to do

things, not because your habits compel you, nor because your friends

persuade you, but because your own wisdom tells you? With wisdom comes

such power of conviction that you don’t need habits to lean on to do the

right thing you should do. As soon as you are convinced of the wisdom of

doing a thing, nothing should be able to turn you away from doing it. But

you have to be guided by wisdom. You can install habits at will by the

power of wisdom. I can make myself like anything that wisdom demands.

The mental habit-patterns of most people have become set, making it

difficult for them to change. Those who keep their minds pliable through

discipline and self-control can easily change. The mind should be like putty.

Wisdom keeps the mind plastic. That is freedom. I want all mankind to

enjoy that freedom from habits. When you have liberated yourself from

habit slavery, you will know there is no happiness greater than in acting as a

freeborn child of God.

Never let life beat you down. Beat life! If you have a strong will you can

overcome all difficulties. Affirm, even in the midst of trials: “Danger and I

were born together, and I am more dangerous than danger!” This is a truth

you should always remember; apply it and you will see that it works. Don’t

behave like a cringing mortal being. You are a child of God!

1 From the hymn, In the Garden, by C. Austin Miles.

2 The death of Paramahansaji’s mother when he was about eleven was a

turning point in his life, strengthening his already ardent spiritual

inclinations into an iron resolve to find God. The divine wisdom garnered in

previous incarnations manifested early in this one; thus he was able by

discrimination to see the inherent disillusionment in the experiences of this

world, and to realize that lasting happiness could come only from God.

(Publisher’s Note)

3 Matthew 26:41.

4 Bhagavad Gita II:60.

5 This is particularly true of persons in whose subconscious minds are

latent strong bad habits from previous lives. The first acceptance of the

temptation to perform that same wrong action in this life triggers an already

long-established habit mechanism from before.

6 Bhagavad Gita XVI:11.

7 Bhagavad Gita IV:36.

Developing Dynamic Will

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, January 11, 1949

God sent man on earth empowered with certain physical, mental, and

spiritual forces that he can wield, and, by their wise use, produce intended

definite results. The force that runs machinery is electricity. And this

complex human machine that God has given us, a movable structure of

bones covered with tender flesh and consisting of trillions of cells, is run by

prana, intelligent life force, traveling like electricity through the wires of the

nerves.

In childhood the body is more responsive to the mind; it can more easily

make the body do its bidding. But later on, as the child develops various

habits, the body and mind do not work in the same harmony as before.

Although, as I have often pointed out, the material form is only a dream in

the consciousness of God, so long as you have to use the physical body, it

should be under the control of your mind.

Troubles will always strike at the body, for this is a law of life; in spite of

difficulties, you should keep such mental neutrality that the mind is not

affected by outer conditions.

St. Francis of Assisi suffered terribly, yet he was mentally unaffected.

Shortly before his death he was going blind. The doctor advised a treatment

that required cauterization of the saint’s face, from the eyebrows back to the

ears, with a white-hot iron bar. There were no anesthetics then. The

disciples present could not bear the sight, but St. Francis told the physician

to proceed with the treatment. He welcomed Brother Fire with sweet words

and never showed that he felt even the slightest connection between the

mind and the body. The Lord wants you also to understand this truth: that

within your perishable body is an inviolable, immortal soul.

It is an error to suppose that masters do not suffer at all. Jesus let his body

suffer the pains of crucifixion, even though he was already redeemed, for he

thereby willingly worked out on his own body some of the karmic suffering

due his disciples and the world. But he knew the relationship between mind

and body; he saw them as a delusory creation in the cosmic dream of God.

The body is merely a cluster of sensations. It is not easy to cut off

sensations, but you can do so by remaining constantly in the consciousness

that you are a soul, one with Spirit. When the mind is almost wholly

dominated by the body and its demands, as is the case with most persons, it

is best to begin gradually, in little things, to dissociate the mind from the

body.

One difference between an ordinary man and a superman is that the

ordinary man cries and gives in to suffering if he is hurt, but the yogi is

established in the consciousness that he is not the body, that he is apart from

it. This realization is with me all the time. Sometimes I see myself walking,

and I am simultaneously aware that I have no body. In the divine

consciousness you realize that you, as soul, have no hands, eyes, ears, or

feet, nor any need of these physical adjuncts; yet you can use and move

these bodily instruments. It is possible to hear, see, smell, taste, and touch

with mind power alone. In clairaudience, for example, one hears through

the power within. Many saints hear the voice of God or one of His angels

guiding them. They hear not with ears but with mind. Such a state of

consciousness is a real experience, not imagination. But it cannot become

your experience unless you meditate. If you meditate with the greatest

devotion, someday when you least expect it you will have the same

experience, and you will understand what I am speaking of.

God is constantly showing me this truth, that the body is unreal. He has also

shown me that this body shall suffer. But the physical suffering this body

will endure has nothing to do with my consciousness. It comes from taking

on the negative karma of others, and has no connection with misery-

producing desires of self. If this body does some good to the world and to

others, fine. A master does not care what happens to his body. He just looks

after it that others may be benefited.

The only time the ordinary person is not conscious of the body is during

sleep; yet upon waking, he is immediately conscious of how well or poorly

he slept. Some materialists think that we are wholly unconscious when we

are asleep, but this is not true. How could we know, upon waking, how well

or ill we slept, unless we were conscious during sleep? We can safely say

that the mind can exist without the body.

Wisdom and Will Govern Body and Mind

What, then, are the principal powers that govern body and mind? Wisdom

and will. Wisdom is the soul’s intuitive, direct knowledge of truth. During

warfare, range finders are used to determine where to fire shells; once the

range is found, the guns are effectively fired. Wisdom is your range finder,

and your will gives the firing power to accomplish your ends according to

the dictates of your wisdom. Your will should always be guided by wisdom.

One without the other is dangerous. If you have wisdom but not sufficient

will to follow through as wisdom dictates, it is hurtful to your well-being; if

you have a strong will but no wisdom, there is every chance of “misfiring”

and destroying yourself.

Your intelligence is not guided by true wisdom if it fails to show you the

right thing that you should do. And, if it doesn’t encourage the strength of

will necessary to carry out the behests of your soul, then that power of

intelligence is not fulfilling its true purpose. “The senses are said to be

superior (to the physical body); the mind is superior to the sense faculties;

the intelligence is superior to the mind; but he (the Self) is superior to the

intelligence.”1

Most people are like automatons. They breakfast, go to work, have lunch,

go back to work, come home to dinner, watch TV, and go to bed; then the

body machine is shut off for the night. Those who live in this way are using

only mechanical will, performing most of their actions as a matter of habit,

accomplishing their duties always in a certain way. They make little or no

effort to exercise their will consciously. True, they are using will power all

the time in performing these habitual actions, but it is purely mechanical; it

is not dynamic will.

Physiological Will—First Expression of Will Power

When human beings are born, the initial expression of will power is the

baby’s first cry, which opens up the lungs and causes breathing to begin.

Sages say that the soul doesn’t like being caged in the feeble little baby

body; its first experience in that form is to cry. The soul realizes that in the

human form it will again go through many struggles, and says, “Lord, why

did you put me here again?” Many babies’ hands are folded at birth. Their

soul is worshiping God in this way and praying, “O Spirit, release me in

this life.”

Will is a tremendous factor in life. It is the power by which you can reach

the heights of God-realization, or go down into the deepest strata of

ignorance. The cry of a newborn child is an expression of physiological

will; the baby wills to remove the discomfort it feels. Most people have not

risen above that state of babyhood. They immediately want to be rid of any

discomfort, and whenever they see anything that attracts them, they cry for

it. They think they have got to have it, that they can’t live without it. The

will that is thus overpowered by the senses is called physiological will—

body-bound will, following the dictates of the senses.

It is terrible to use any kind of drug, for the drug enslaves the will to the

body. I once knew a man who used opium. All day long he slept in a stupor.

It took him years to overcome his slavery. To use narcotics is one of the

greatest sins against Spirit. Drink is the same. Both mean destruction of will

power. The great saints have warned against them. Under no circumstance

should you let yourself be tempted, for in a short while you can be lost.

Drink and drugs are sins against the soul because they paralyze the will,

without which soul-realization and salvation are impossible.

Many people are bound by physiological will. The very power that governs

prana and enables it to efficiently operate the human machine is destroyed

when strong habits of sex or drink or hatred take over. And once they are

established they are very difficult to conquer. Once you are in the habit of

showing temper whenever you are crossed, you follow that habit in spite of

your wish to behave otherwise. Habit destroys the supreme gift of heaven—

will power—by which you can work out your own salvation.

Without Wisdom, Will Becomes Habit-Bound

If God and heaven were imposed on us, then we would be their slaves. But

the Lord has given us free choice by which we can accept good or cast it

out, accept evil or cast it out. The powers that God has given you by which

you can make this choice are wisdom and will. Find out whether you have

control over your will or not. Don’t let your will be devitalized by bad

habits.

After physiological will comes habit-bound will. Your will automatically

enters this second phase unless it is guided by wisdom. Sometimes a good

man’s child is lacking in truthfulness and good habits. Certainly the child

has had every opportunity to learn to be good; yet the moment he becomes

old enough to start using his own will, he gets into all kinds of mischief.

Why? Usually in such cases the child’s nature from past lives is karmically

inclined toward wrong thinking and habits. Through his family training in

this life he learns to perform good actions; but they are only superimposed

on his real nature. Because his will is controlled only by mechanical good

habits, rather than by soul wisdom and true understanding, he readily

succumbs to temptations when he is free of the good influence of the

family.

If you ask thieves and habitual drinkers if they like their way of life, they

usually say “No.” They thought when they started their wrong actions that

they would be happy. They never realized that the effects would be hurtful

to them. For this reason I deeply feel for people who have done wrong. I cry

for them. “But for the grace of God, there go I.” Evil is a sort of opiate.

That is why we should have places where people who have gone wrong can

learn how to live and how to think. Jail is not a suitable place of reform.

Such persons need to mix with superior men who can help them.

All around you are thieves of circumstances, trying to steal your vitality of

will; but no one can take away your will but yourself. The child wants his

own way. When he grows up, unless his will has been curbed and guided by

wisdom, he finds that he is a slave to desires. Are you not doing things

today that you know you ought not to do, and which you know will bring

you unhappiness later on? Overstimulation of the senses devitalizes the

will, so do not create an unnatural craving for anything. Suppose you like a

certain food very much. Your will power should be such that you can do

without it henceforth.

It is impossible to say what you really like and don’t like, because your

inclinations are always changing. If you analyze yourself you will see that

in the matter of likes and dislikes we are all crazy. We don’t know why we

like certain things and don’t like others. What you like through the

influence of your wisdom, and what you like as a result of your

physiological habits, are two different things. I can make myself like

something, and the next minute I can make myself repelled by it.

To be guided by wisdom is to be king of the world. The wise man tries first

to determine if he is right; then he acts. But if he makes a decision and then

finds out he was wrong, he immediately acknowledges his mistake. Never

use your will power to be stubborn. You can talk with some people for an

hour, and they seemingly agree with you, and then they turn around and say

just the opposite. They don’t want to give up their own way. That is not will

power, but slavery to the ego. You can see such slaves all around you. They

think they are free, but their will is chained; they perform actions

mechanically, guided by good or by evil habits. But when you can say, “I

stay away from evil because evil works against my happiness,” or “I am

good, not because I am forced to be, but because good leads to my own

happiness”—that is wisdom. Such was my Guru’s training. One thing we

should always remember: If will is guided by wisdom, it will produce

something constructive in our life.

When Jesus said to the Heavenly Father, “Thy will be done,”2 it was not

because he lacked will power, but because he wanted his will to be guided

by God’s. When the Divine Will intimated, “Give up the body,” Jesus had

to use a great deal of will power to conquer the weakness of the flesh.

Human will has become divine will, completely attuned to Spirit, when

even though it is necessary to give up the body, one is able to do so

willingly, as Christ did. A body-bound slave would have said, “They are

trying to crucify me; I must try to save myself.” If Jesus had done that, he

would not have been the Christ who lives in our hearts today.

Stages of Will Development

Man progresses from the physiological will of infancy to the unthinking

will of childhood. That is when he is used to obeying his mother, doing

whatever she tells him to do. After unthinking will comes blind will; he gets

away from the mother’s will and begins to feel his own will power. This

comes in youth. He tests his own will and begins to use it to get what he

sets his heart on.

As a child I wanted a bicycle and I got it. Then I wanted a horse, but I

didn’t get it. A long time after, though, I did receive it. Every desire that I

have had has been satisfied by the Lord. Everything I have wished for has

come to me. That was His blessing.

I was always careful that my wish was right before I used my will to carry it

out. It is good to be stubborn in good things, but never otherwise. When you

are wrong, you should correct yourself. If you don’t blind yourself to good

by using your will for wrong things, then you progress from blind will to

thinking will.

After Mother died, when I was only eleven years old, and so grief-stricken!

my eldest sister Roma loved to guide me. Others tried to use force, but

Roma won me by love. Even when I was obstinately saying to her, “Go

away, go away,” I found myself obeying her wishes.

The nature of a saint is tender like a flower, but stronger than thunder when

he makes up his mind about something good, because his will is guided by

wisdom. It was not the easiest thing to convince my Guru when I felt I had

a better idea, but as soon as he saw that I offered a different angle he would

say: “You are right. Let us do it that way.” But when I was wrong, he

couldn’t be moved.

Thinking will is the most marvelous instrument you can imagine. Are you

governed by thinking will, or by blind will, or by physiological will?

Thinking will is the way toward wisdom. When you get a notion in your

mind that you must go to the movies, that is physiological will. And when

you decide, “Well, it doesn’t matter, I will go some other time,” that is

thinking will.

Will that is not guided by habit is thinking will. If you don’t want to smoke,

you should not smoke. If you do not feel hungry, don’t eat just because of

habit. Whenever I wish to refrain from taking food, no one can tempt me to

eat. Another habit amongst those hardest to control is that of harsh speech.

Speaking unkindly to others paralyzes your will. Never be cranky.

Whenever you get angry you make your face ugly. Be so loving and kind

that everyone who meets you says of you, “I would like to see that person

again.” When you control your own speech you will not be so sensitive to

others’ remarks about you. I quit anger when I was a little child. But I often

discipline with strong words those understanding ones whom God has sent

me for training. To those who don’t understand, I never say anything.

See how wonderful will power is. After you have developed thinking will,

you begin to reason, “I must produce something worthwhile with this

power,” and you take up one thing at a time and try to accomplish it. You

revolve that will around a problem of health or of finances or of controlling

a habit, or around the desire to know God. If you will and act until victory,

then you have attained dynamic will.

The World Will Try to Trick You

Everything in life tempts you away from God. In the beginning most

devotees fall down, because they don’t use their divine will; they put off

meditation. Day after day, week after week, they put it off. You know you

want to love God, you know you ought to get busy making the effort now,

and still you procrastinate. I remember a period in my childhood when I lost

a great deal of time in this manner. I was already meditating every day, and

I had resolved to meditate much longer each day. But I kept putting it off

until suddenly I realized a whole year had gone by. Then I remembered the

story about the cat and the sparrow.

The cat caught a sparrow, but the sparrow was wise. He reminded the cat

that it was proper first to lick clean his face and paws in preparation for the

sparrow meal. This made sense to the cat, so he let the sparrow go and took

his time washing himself. In the meantime the sparrow flew away to a high

branch. The cat finally said, “You can come down now. I am ready for my

dinner.” But the sparrow chirped, “Too bad; I am now at the top of the tree.”

So the cat resolved: “Henceforth, I will eat my sparrow first and then wash

myself.”

First things must come first. When you awaken in the morning, meditate. If

you don’t, the whole world will crowd in to claim you, and you will forget

God. At night, meditate before sleep claims you. I am so strongly

established in the habit of meditation that even after I lie down to sleep at

night, I find I am meditating. I can’t sleep in the ordinary way. The habit of

being with God comes first.

In Your Will Power Lies the Image of God

Will power means freedom. Will power means Heaven. If you don’t permit

your will to be weakened by the attractions of the world, you will reach

your divine goal. But most of you have allowed your will to be sapped by

bad habits—many of you indulge in them every day—smoking, drinking,

angry speech. You think you can’t do without these things. But there was a

time when you didn’t know what smoke was, or what drink was, or what

anger was. You have given up your freedom by acquiring these habits. Must

you remain a slave to them? How can you find God unless you free your

will power, by eliminating these worldly habits and by using that will to

meditate instead?

No matter what happens to your body, meditate. Never go to sleep at night

until you have communed with God. Your body will remind you that you

have worked hard and need rest, but the more you ignore its demands and

concentrate on the Lord, the more you will burn with joyous life, like a

globe afire. Then you will know that you are not the body. In your will

power lies the image of God. That image has been desecrated because you

have made a slave of your mind. When I left India to come to America, my

Guru said: “Forget you were born among Hindus, and don’t adopt all the

ways of the Americans....Be your true self, a child of God.” By following

his wise advice, I have kept my will free. If the whole world stood against

me, and I saw that I was right and others were wrong, I would not change

my mind.

Nothing Is Impossible When Will Becomes Dynamic

Choose a good, wholesome, constructive goal and then determine that you

are going to achieve it. No matter how many times you fail, keep on trying.

No matter what happens, if you have unalterably resolved, “The earth may

be shattered, but I will keep on doing the best I can,” you are using dynamic

will, and you will succeed. That dynamic will is what makes one man rich

and another man strong and another man a saint.

It is not Jesus and a few others who alone know God. If you make the right

kind of effort, you will find God. What is the value of using dynamic will

today to be a great doctor, or a successful businessman, when tomorrow you

may die? This is why Jesus said, “Seek ye first the kingdom of God.”3 Use

your will to know God first; then He will direct your path in life.

You are using dynamic will when day and night you whisper within, “Lord,

Lord, Lord,” with the deepest desire to find Him. It is better to use your will

to seek God than for anything else. I am so happy that He blessed me with

the divine will power that my guru, Sri Yukteswarji, awakened in me.

Before I met Master I was exercising that will power right and left in

useless things. But even then, whenever I started something, I employed

dynamic will to complete it.

I remember the first time I used dynamic will to help others. My friend and

I were just little boys then. One day I said to him, “We are going to feed

five hundred people.”

“But we haven’t a cent!” he exclaimed. “We are going to do it just the

same,” I assured him. “And I think the money is going to come through

you.”

“That is impossible!” he scoffed. An intuitive conviction prompted me to

say: “Don’t offend your mother in any way. Do whatever she asks you to

do.”

One day later he came running and told me this story. “I was bathing and

Mother called me. I was going to say, ‘Don’t bother me now while I am

bathing,’ but instead I asked her what she wanted. She told me to go and see

my aunt who lived nearby. I said, ‘All right.’

“When I went to see my aunt, the first thing she said to me was, ‘Who is

this crazy boy you are mixing with? Have you lost your mind? What is this

I hear about your feeding five hundred people?’ I was angry with her. ‘I

must leave now,’ I told her, and started to go. But she stopped me, saying,

‘Your friend may be crazy, but his idea is good. Here are twenty rupees.’”

The boy had nearly fainted with surprise. He ran to me at once to tell me the

news. When we went to buy the rice and other things, the people in the

neighborhood had already heard of our plan, and added more food. In the

end we fed two thousand people! The same divinely charged will power

also brought about the first library I founded, Saraswat Library in Calcutta.

When you make up your mind to do good things, you will accomplish them

if you use dynamic will power to follow through. No matter what the

circumstances are, if you go on trying, God will create the means by which

your will shall find its proper reward. This is the truth Jesus referred to

when he said: “If ye have faith, and doubt not,...if ye shall say unto this

mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea, it shall be

done.”4 If you continuously use your will power, no matter what reverses

come, it will produce success and health and power to help people, and

above all, it will produce communion with God.

This is the kind of will power you must develop—the will power that will

run the ocean dry if necessary in order to accomplish what is good. The

greatest will should be used to meditate. The Lord wants us to discover our

divine will and use it to find Him. Develop this God-seeking dynamic will.

It is not profound words that will give you emancipation, but your own

efforts through meditation.

1 Bhagavad Gita III:42.

2 Matthew 26:42.

3 Matthew 6:33.

4 Matthew 21:21.

Seek God Now!

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles,

California, July 15, 1941

God-realization is attained only by great effort on the part of the yogi, and

by divine grace. Though God can be approached by law, still, as the

Searcher of Hearts, He must be convinced that a devotee really wants Him

before He sends His grace. God withholds final illumination from a

devotee, however perfected he may be in the science of Yoga, who does not

wholeheartedly desire Him.

I recall a time in the ashram of my guru, Swami Sri Yukteswar, when month

after month, with the greatest devotion, I was seeking God; yet I was

experiencing a sort of stagnation. When I questioned Master about my

problem, he said, “You think that if you had more mental power or more

miracle power you would realize more fully that God is with you. But that

is not so. Suppose He responded by giving you control over the whole

universe. Possession of such power would leave your heart still unsatisfied.

God is the Ever New Joy you already feel in meditation. When man loves

that Joy above everything else in this world, desiring it more than money

and fame, more than his indulgences in moods and habits and sensory

experiences, God will open the way.” Few devotees are prepared to make

such “sacrifices.”1

It is at once very easy and very hard to please God. He is playing with His

devotees even in tests, and He tests them all the time.

How easy it is to pack the day with foolishness, how difficult to fill it with

worthwhile activities and thoughts! Yet God is not so much interested in

what we are doing as in where the mind is. Everyone has a different

difficulty, but God doesn’t listen to any excuses. He wants the devotee’s

mind to be engrossed in Him in spite of any troublesome circumstances.

Even as I am engaged in talking to you now, my mind is ever on God. I am

with Him inwardly all the time. I live in His joy. Loving and craving naught

else but that joy, I find that all obstacles to God-union give way before me.

This declaration is not a fairy tale; it is true. But not until God has received

all of the devotee’s love will He come. It will seem that He has forsaken us

sometimes, but such tests are inescapable; if we steadfastly refuse to give

up our search, God receives us as His own.

In worldly ambitions there is always an element of uncertainty. Some

people spend year after year trying wholeheartedly but unsuccessfully to

make money. But in the spiritual path no wholehearted devotee is ever

unsuccessful. His labors are never in vain.

Perseverance Is the Whole Magic of Spiritual Success

The greatest enemy of divine realization is the body; it becomes easily tired

and wants to give up. A true devotee never relaxes his effort nor admits the

supremacy of the body. Continuous vigilance is required. We must believe,

against all seeming odds, that He will come. Even an agnostic who thinks

that there is little likelihood that God exists, but who perseveres in the

search for Him, will ultimately find Him. Even though God may not seem

to respond, one should not succumb to doubts but should unremittingly

continue in the holy quest. Perseverance is the whole magic of spiritual

success. If the Lord responded easily and openly to the devotee’s prayers

for divine illumination, all men would immediately seek Him—not for love

of Him, but for the illimitable rewards.

This world is God’s playhouse. It is part of His intricate drama here that He

has made it very difficult to discover His presence. Because the search is

not easy, we tend to forget Him. Even when we see our loved ones pulled

away into the mysterious unknown, we do not think seriously about our

having to go too, sometime. But one should not wait for the approach of

death to realize the importance of seeking God. It is every man’s supreme

and immediate duty. Each minute of life should be a divine quest. The

burning question in our hearts should be: “When shall I find Thee, O

Lord?”

No matter what happens, never give up the vital search. Suppose one sits to

meditate, and friends arrive. There is nothing to do but to cut the meditation

short; yet one may still keep his mind on God. Whatever the activity, the

inner attention should be on Him. He is so necessary to us!

Get busy now; time is passing, and one day the fearful realization will come

that life has gone by as though in a twinkling, and still He has not been

found. Let no day pass without your having made an effort to meditate on

Him. Soon, surprisingly little effort will be needed. Great happiness comes

to the devotee who is steadfast. Without unquenchable enthusiasm nothing

can be gained.

The Bhagavad Gita teaches the importance on the spiritual path of rising

above bodily sensations. The contact of the senses with outer environment

produces sensations of heat and cold, pleasure and pain, and other

oppositional states. The average man is easily affected by these sensations,

but the Gita teaches that one should be neutral to them. This is not a

recommendation to be rash! If the yogi finds the sensations of heat or cold

are extremely difficult to bear, he should seek an outward remedy without

becoming inwardly involved. He who can practice mental neutrality is on

the way to becoming a saint. He who lives in the bodily temple without

being affected by changing sensory perceptions, remaining evenminded

during pleasure and pain, cool and heat, and so on, becomes a true king

among men. Having attained changelessness, he is one with the changeless

Spirit.

All who came to my Guru’s ashram for spiritual training were disciplined in

this way. The aspiring yogi of the West as well as of the East must

discipline himself similarly. He should refrain from making too much fuss

about the body. If he sees he is finding time for everything else but is too

busy for God, he should take the whip of discipline to himself. Why be

afraid? There is everything to gain. If a man will not himself cry and

struggle to attain his own salvation, will anyone else do it for him?

God-realization is the most difficult state to reach. Let no one fool himself,

nor think that someone else can “give” it to him. Whenever I fell into a state

of mental stagnation, my Guru could do nothing for me. But I never gave

up trying to keep in tune with him by cheerfully performing whatever he

asked me to do. “I have come to him for God-realization,” I reasoned, “and

I must listen to his advice.” At his ashram we young disciples seemed to be

always cooking, and there were many other excuses not to meditate. Yet

even though I worked harder there than in my own home, I found the

environment of the ashram to be spiritually helpful to me.

Keep a Daily Appointment With God

Let no devotee miss his daily appointment with God. The mind may suggest

the movies or some other distraction; but when the time comes for God

each day, keep that sacred engagement. Otherwise you will be a long time

finding Him.

There is a personal element in the search for God that is more important

than mastery over the whole science of Yoga. The Heavenly Father wants to

be sure that His children desire only Him, that they will not be satisfied

with anything else. When God is made to feel that He is not first in the

devotee’s heart, He stands aside. But to him who says, “O Lord, it matters

not if I lose sleep tonight, so long as I am with Thee,” He will come.

Positively! From behind the countless screens of this mysterious world the

Ruler of creation will come forth to reveal Himself behind each one. He

talks to His true devotees, and plays hide-and-seek with them. Sometimes

He suddenly unveils a comforting truth when one is worried. In time, and in

direct or indirect ways, He grants every wish of His devotee.

Fulfillment of a particular desire seems necessary only if one lacks

conviction that he can find perfect fulfillment in God. One who is at peace

in God is not tortured by unfulfilled earthly desires. “Taking shelter in Me,

all beings can achieve the Supreme Fulfillment....”2 No one can hurt me by

thwarting me in some outward matter, because to me God is sufficient; His

joyous presence is the only conditioning factor in my happiness. Each of

you should try resolutely to meditate and to feel His presence, and see how

quickly you will become aware of His favor.

The world worships men of power, like Alexander the Great and Napoleon,

but think of their mental states! Then think of the peace that Christ had. His

peace could not be taken from him. We think we will seek that peace

“tomorrow.” Anyone who reasons this way will never find it. Seek it now.

We do not neglect eating and our other duties to the body. They are very

important to us. But one who loves God intensely loses all worry about the

body. This is what Jesus meant when he said: “Take no thought for your

life, what ye shall eat; neither for the body, what ye shall put on.”3

Not until you feel in your consciousness the absolute importance of God

will you reach Him. Do not permit life to cheat you. Form those good habits

that make for true happiness. Follow a simple diet, exercise the body, and

meditate daily—no matter what happens, rain or shine. If you are unable to

exercise and meditate in the morning, do it at night. Pray to Him every day,

“Lord, even if I die, or if the whole world crumbles away, I am going to

find time daily to be with Thee.”

Who is interested in God alone? Very few. Most people want to talk about

spirits and miracles and so on. But he who knows God will be told by Him

everything he has ever wanted to know.

Kriya Yoga—Highest Method of God-Contact

Kriya Yoga is the highest method of God-contact. In my own search for

God I traveled all over India, and heard wisdom from the lips of a number

of her greatest masters. I can therefore vouch for the fact that in Self-

Realization teachings are the highest truths and scientific techniques given

to mankind by God and the Great Ones.

The aftereffects of Kriya bring with them the utmost peace and bliss. The

joy that comes with Kriya is greater than the joys of all pleasurable physical

sensations put together. “Unattracted to the sensory world, the yogi

experiences the ever new joy inherent in the Self. Engaged in divine union

of the soul with Spirit, he attains bliss indestructible.”4 From that joy

experienced in meditation I receive the rest of a thousand sleeps. Sleep

becomes virtually unnecessary to the advanced Kriya Yogi.

When by Kriya Yoga the devotee enters samadhi, wherein his eyes, breath,

and heart are quieted, another world comes into view. Breath, sound, and

movement of the eyes belong to this world. But the yogi who has control of

the breath5 may enter the heavenly astral and causal worlds and commune

there with God’s saints, or enter cosmic consciousness and commune with

God. The yogi is not interested in anything else.

Whoever will give less importance to everything else, remembering what I

have said, will get to God without fail. Everyone must eventually get there.

But what is the use of my telling these truths to you unless you practice

them? My loving attention on you is not wanting; but even if I were to

remind you each day of these truths, they would not help anyone who does

not himself make the effort to practice meditation. No one is greater than

God, enthroned in the heart of every man; yet even He does not force us to

seek Him. He has given us free will. But he who follows a true guru, and

keeps faith with him by adhering to his instructions, will transform his

whole life. “Comprehending that wisdom from a guru, thou wilt not again

fall into delusion.”6

To Find God, Be Loyal to God

It is easy to see in a person’s face whether or not he is a lover of God. True

devotees may be called fanatical in their devotion to Him. The only right

kind of fanaticism is loyalty to God—night and day, night and day, thinking

of Him. Without this kind of loyalty it is impossible to find God. Those who

never miss Kriya, and who sit long in meditation and pray intensely to God,

will discover the longed-for Treasure.

This world is but a dream. Just as in the movies there is no essential

difference between the ocean and the sky, which are simply two different

rates of light-vibration, so it is in this world. Sorrow and joy, pain and

pleasure, cold and heat are but dreams of this world. The Lord is the only

Reality. We should always pray that no test or temptation will ever have the

power to make us forget Him. When I pray thus I receive more result than

at any other time. Then, even if something very serious comes to divert me,

I nevertheless see immediately that I am safe in His arms.

It is difficult to know Him. The path to God is like a razor’s edge. But

discouragement is never justified, because we don’t have to acquire or win

anything; we have only to realize that God is already within us. That is why

negativeness should be completely put out of one’s mind. Cooperating with

the guru’s thoughts makes the path easy. If the disciple says, “I can’t do

this; it is too hard for me,” he is held back. No one has entangled us in

moods and habits and desires but ourselves, and no one but ourselves will

free us.

Keep a diary of your spiritual life. I used to make a record of how long I

had meditated daily and how deep I had gone. Seek solitude as much as

possible. Do not spend your leisure in mixing with people for merely social

purposes. God’s love is hard to find in company. The Lord is discovered in

silence, and Kriya shows you the way.

To establish God-consciousness in the souls of men is my great interest. I

see that everything else is futile. The one purpose of Self-Realization

Fellowship is to teach the individual the way to personal contact with God.

Those who make the effort cannot miss Him. Make a solemn promise in

your heart and pray to the Father that He bless you with the haunting desire

to find Him, that you may not waste any more time in the useless diversions

of this earth.

Pray to the Father: “As we are bound by Thy laws of creation to work, may

we perform our duties only to please Thee. Bless us every moment, that we

realize Thou art more important than eating or sleeping or anything else.

Bless us that we be able to meet Thy tests and to avoid the terrible

temptations of the flesh. May we all, thy princely children, be diademed in

Thy bosom.”

And my prayer for each of you is that from today you will make a supreme

effort for God, and that you never give up until you are established in Him.

If you love Him you will practice Kriya with the greatest devotion and

faithfulness. Continuously seek Him through prayer and Kriya Yoga. Be of

good cheer, for as Babaji once said, quoting from the Bhagavad Gita:7

“Even a tiny bit of this real religion protects one from great fear (the

colossal sufferings inherent in the repeated cycles of birth and death).”

1 “The harvest truly is plenteous, but the laborers are few” (Matthew 9:37).

2 Bhagavad Gita IX:32.

3 Luke 12:22.

4 Bhagavad Gita V:21.

5 See breath in glossary.

6 Bhagavad Gita IV:35.

7 Bhagavad Gita II:40.

Administration building at international headquarters, Self-Realization

Fellowship (Yogoda Satsanga Society of India), established by

Paramahansa Yogananda in 1925 atop Mt. Washington in Los Angeles,

California.

Why Waste Time? God Is the Joy You Seek

An informal talk to resident renunciants and guests at Self-Realization

Fellowship International Headquarters, Los Angeles, California, on

Christmas Day, 1939

This Christmas will remain in my memory always, for it is a great joy and

privilege to be with devotees of the Lord. Yesterday, when we communed

with Christ in our all-day meditation here, we felt that we are all one family

in God. In meditation, souls meet on the plane of the heart and rejoice in

Spirit.

May all men and all churches be inspired by the humble example of our

spiritual celebration of Christmas to devote, as we have, one day entirely to

worship of the Christ Consciousness. The eight hours that we meditated

yesterday passed like eight minutes! The love of God is greater than all the

pleasures of the senses. If once we experience His love in the heart, we

become so imbued with it we can never forget it. Last night I had no sleep,

but I didn’t need sleep. For in the eternal joy that I feel in the Christ

Consciousness nothing else matters at all.

Dear ones, my greatest gift to you this Christmas is my love. To love all, to

sacrifice for all, and to have boundless pleasure in helping others—this is

the grace I have received. We should do for others as if it were for

ourselves. If a coat that we need costs fifty dollars, we spend it gladly.

When we can do that for another with the same sense of joy, we know the

true spirit of giving.

“My Words Shall Not Pass Away”

May the Christmas spirit you feel not end with today; rather may it be with

you every night as you meditate. Then in the silence of your own mind, as

you drive away all restless thoughts, Christ Consciousness will come. If we

all follow the spirit of Jesus we shall surely experience every day his

presence within us. For the Christ Consciousness that was manifest in Jesus

was not meant to be the light of one century only, but of all centuries for

eternity. That is why Jesus said: “Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my

words shall not pass away.”1 The joy that Christ felt, the joy that he told the

world to seek, and the spiritual rules of conduct he exhorted us to follow—

to love our enemies and to turn the other cheek—are timeless. The

commandment to love God with all your heart, mind, and soul was not

intended merely for the biblical generations; it is an eternal law.

Life Is a Caravan

Many who were with us last Christmas are not with us now, and who knows

who will be here next Christmas? Such is the way of life. And still life goes

on. It is a caravan in which we are traveling for a little while. Some of our

companions have fallen into ditches of folly and ignorance, but when they

are tired of the suffering they experience, they will begin to seek the safe

guidance of the Owner of the caravan, who is also the Owner of this earth—

none other than the Heavenly Father. Even though we part in this caravan,

and the beginning and end of our journey are shrouded in darkness, still, life

has a deep meaning: to teach us to seek God earnestly.

This world may also be likened to a play. The actors do not come out of

nowhere; there is a backstage. After their part is over, the players do not

cease to exist; they only go behind the scenes for a rest. It is the scheme of

the Stage Manager that we come here to play for a time on this stage of life;

then we depart. We are not dead—only backstage, hidden behind the screen

of time, according to the direction of the Stage Manager. And we will be

seen on this stage of life again and again, until we become such good actors

that we can play our parts perfectly, according to the Divine Will. Then He

will say: “You need go no more out. You have done My Will. You have

played your part, and acted well. You did not lose courage. Now you have

come back to Me, to be a pillar of immortality in the temple of My Eternal

Existence.”2

Good Company Is of Supreme Importance

To play your part well on earth is not easy. It is only by good associations

that you can find your way out of the darkness of ignorance. The blind

cannot lead the blind. Mixing with those who love only social gatherings

will waste your time, but association with those who love God will give you

the love of God. The Lord said in the Bhagavad Gita: “Among thousands of

men, perhaps one strives for spiritual attainment; and, among the blessed

true seekers that assiduously try to reach Me, perhaps one perceives Me as I

am.”3 Very few people are interested in God. It is said that the child is busy

with play, the youth is busy with sex, and the adult is busy with worries.

How few think of the eternal bliss of Spirit! But he who seeks God, and

who seeks with all the depth and fervor of his soul until he finds Him, is

wisest of all men. The Lord knows what you think; and if you love Him He

will reveal Himself to you.

Never Forget God

No matter what I have gone through, my joy has been like a silent stream

continuously flowing beneath the sands of my thoughts. These silent rivers

of divine joy cannot be seen with the eyes, but whenever you dig deeply

through the outer layers of consciousness you discover them. Let not

anyone else know how deeply you feel for the Lord. The Master of the

Universe knows of your love; don’t display it before others, or you may

lose it.

When in the silence of the soul and in every phase of life you turn within

and say, “Father, I have not forgotten You”—when that kind of devotion

wells up from the depths of your heart—God comes to drink from the

fountain of your love. The only purpose of life is to enjoy Him. It is

possible. I would not speak of it if I didn’t know His limitless joy and bliss.

You too must find Him. God is. The saints have not lied to you. And I am

not lying to you. Then why waste time? Why be forgetful of Him? I know

how terrible are the consequences. Forgetfulness of that inner Source of

happiness is the cause of all human suffering and misery.

We put forth our hands to receive His gifts of life and sun and food and all

the other things He bestows on us; but even as we receive them, we are

unmindful of the Giver. If you have lovingly given presents to someone and

then find out that he never thinks of you, how hurt you feel! God feels that

way, too. Every day we use His gift of sight to see the world; we accept His

gifts of thought and reason, but we are oblivious of Him.

If God is ever a beggar, it is to ask your love. He is continuously pursuing

you; He coaxes you through the words of the saints. Do not ignore Him!

March on Toward the Lord’s Kingdom

The joy that you felt yesterday after eight hours’ meditation is continuous

with me. Naught else could give me so much happiness. Everything else is

a waste of time. Why hang on to worldly delusions? Every minute that I am

with you I will try to impress on your consciousness the importance of

seeking God. Remember, when you are trying to improve spiritually, you

are moving toward His kingdom; and when you are not trying, you are

standing still, or slipping backward. March on! Use your nights for

meditation. That is the way to discover Him. It seems very hard to find

God, yet He is the easiest to please as soon as you convince Him that He

means everything to you. That day He will come to you.

Dear friends, I hope this Christmas will not end tonight for you. My

Christmas never ends. It is with me day and night. The Lord is with me and

I am with Him. That is His promise in the Bhagavad Gita: “He who

perceives Me everywhere and beholds everything in Me never loses sight of

Me, nor do I ever lose sight of him.”4

Those who are addicted to wine are all the time drunk. Whether they are

working or playing, their mind is on liquor. The Divine Nectar is a million

times more intoxicating. When I am talking to you I am just as much with

Him as when I am meditating. Such love! No tongue can ever describe this

happiness. The Bible mentions that on the day of Pentecost the Apostles

were enveloped by the Holy Ghost. Doubters said, “These men are full of

new wine.”5 They were drunk, indeed, but with the wine of divine bliss!

The wellspring of undiluted joy of Spirit lies buried within your soul. Dig

with the pickax of meditation until you discover it, and bathe in that

fountain of eternal bliss.

And so, dear ones, my Christmas will go on forever, in ever- increasing joy

everlasting. If this joy were limited, as worldly happiness is, a time would

come when all would be finished. But no saint will ever be able to exhaust

the ever new bliss of God. Even though the masters know Him fully, His

joy is ever new to them throughout eternity. If the delights of Spirit were

not endless, even the saints would want to come back to earth now and then

for diversion, like ordinary mortals who return again and again. But the

saints are eternally happy, as no one else is. This is the wealth they receive

when they give up everything else for love of the Lord. Nothing can destroy

the joy and peace of their being. That is Christhood.

Please Man by Pleasing God

Therefore seek only to please God. Try to please man, too, but not at the

cost of pleasing Him. To attain the recognition of man by your own God-

realization is the greatest thing you can do. Time is flying. Why are you

waiting? There is no reality to worldly life. Though you have to eat and

sleep, one day the switch of your heart will be suddenly pulled, and you

will have to leave everything behind. When a visitor said to me, “I am too

busy to meditate,” I replied: “When you die, all your engagements will be

canceled. What then? Where will you be if you haven’t found God? Your

friends will mourn briefly and then resume their usual preoccupations. Why

neglect your one Eternal Friend?”

Wisdom becomes dimmed when you use your mind wrongly, or mix with

bad company. To seek God is the highest way to happiness. Neither human

love nor any other mortal experience comes near His bliss. Anyone who

tells you that something else is more important than seeking the Lord is

wrong. Nothing can be greater than finding Him who created you. This is

why the Hindu scriptures say: “Forsaking all duties, if it is necessary,

pursue Me. For the forsaking of all duties you will incur sin, but I shall

forgive that because no duties can be performed without receiving power

from Me.”6 Duty to God nullifies all other duties. When you resolutely

leave everything else to attain Him, then you are on the path to realization.

To be able to do duty to God and to man is wonderful. To do duty to God

without duty to the world is all right. And to do duty to the world and not to

God is to be like a mule carrying a bag of gold. The mule knows only the

weight of the gold; he cannot use it. To do duty to God first, and then, with

His consciousness to help the world, is divine. And this is what the Self-

Realization Fellowship teachings stand for: to gain fellowship with God

through realization of the Self; and, having that divine fellowship, help

others to attain it.7

Wherever your heart is, there your mind is also. Wherever those you love

may be in the world, your heart is drawn to them. You must feel that way

about God; you must love Him with all your heart. And love Him also with

all your mind; if your thoughts are roaming as you pray, it is a mockery.

Last of all, love God with all your soul. As you approach God, defeating all

your temptations with the sword of wisdom, closing one by one the doors of

the senses, and one by one saying good-bye to restless worldly thoughts,

then you will love God with all your heart, all your mind, and all your soul.

The moon’s reflection in a cup of water that has been stirred appears

distorted, but the moon’s reflection is seen perfectly when the water in the

cup becomes quiet. Similarly, the soul image has become distorted by the

restlessness of your mind, but when you still the mind, by loving God with

all your heart, mind, and soul, you behold, within, the clear reflection of the

Divine.

God is twinkling in the Milky Way, and through our intelligence and reason.

He is present in every blade of grass; every flower mirrors His smile. In

every good thought there is the joy of Spirit. He is everlasting. As you

develop spiritually you see that He is your true Self, reflected in you as the

soul, just as the moon can be reflected in a vessel of water; you realize that

you are the pure image of Divinity. By greater effort you become able to

break the vessel of the mortal ego; then the reflected soul image within it

becomes one with the moon of Spirit.

Seek the Recognition of God

We don’t want the praise of man; the recognition of God is what we are

seeking. “For what everyone is in Thy sight, so much is he, and no more,”

said St. Francis. If before Him we are immaculate, nothing else matters. In

doing good we must sometimes suffer. To find the Lord we must be willing

to suffer. What is it to endure discomfort of the flesh and discipline of the

mind to gain the eternal solace of Spirit? Christ’s joy in God was so great he

was willing to give up the body for Him. The purpose of life is to attain that

tremendous happiness—to find God.

Renunciation is not an end; it is the means to an end. The real renunciant is

he who lives for God first, regardless of his outer mode of existence. To

love God and conduct your life to please Him—that is what matters. When

you will do that, you will know the Lord. Every noble thought in your mind

brings you closer to Him. Those thoughts are like a river leading to the

ocean of Spirit.

Devotion is the one offering that tempts God. He is not moved by all the

rich gifts and promises that are made to Him. But into the garden of a life

redolent with sweet devotion God is tempted to come. When the fragrance

of your devotion oozes forth unceasingly from the rose of your heart, the

mighty Deity must come to you.

No matter how our thoughts run away from the Lord or how forlorn we

feel, still the footsteps of our devotion lead us to the haven of Spirit. No

matter how far we have strayed away, through devotion we can still reach

Him; our lives need not be spent in vain.

Although you have regular duties, they are no excuse for saying you cannot

seek God. While others sleep, you concentrate on Him. You will find you

are a hundred times more happy and rested. Do this night after night,

without thinking of time. When you are meditating, just remind yourself, “I

am with Him, and that is all that matters.”

When you plant a seed in the ground, you must not take it out every day to

see if it is germinating; you will only hamper its growth. So with the seeds

of your spiritual efforts. Once they are planted, leave them there, and tend

them carefully.

I hope you will make a greater spiritual effort from tonight on. Don’t lose

sight of Him. The world will go on without you. You are not as important as

you think. Countless men have been thrown into the dustbin of the

centuries. Do not let your life pass uselessly. If in your heart you love God,

you are greater than the most materially accomplished man. When you

please God, you come closest to pleasing everybody. So learn to love Him.

Don’t feel that you have to mix with people all the time. When you do mix,

do everything you can to help others; but when you are alone, be alone with

God. When you attain Him, all things else will be added unto you.

It is not what you hear that redeems you, but what you do with what you

hear. Many hear what they should do, but few act upon it. Don’t paralyze

your determination. When you know a thing is right, why shouldn’t you go

after it? Why shouldn’t you cry for the Lord until the skies are shaken with

your prayers? Surrender to Him completely. And never doubt Him.

Dive deep in the ocean of meditation. If you don’t find the pearls of His

presence, don’t blame the ocean, blame your diving. Dive again and again

until you find Him. “Seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened

unto you.”8 Remember, it is the naughty baby who gets the mother’s

attention. The easily pacified infant is soon satisfied with toys. But the

naughty baby wants the mother only, and goes on crying until she comes.

Cry until the Divine Mother comes!

God is so real to His devotees! Every word they have said about Him is

true, but His play is shrouded in mystery. Your seeking must be continuous.

You cannot summon God by a little cry; it must be unceasing, and not

quelled by toys of money, fame, and human love. When your desire is only

for Him, He will come. Then your lessons in the world are finished. You are

filled evermore with the joy of the Infinite. “He who works for Me alone,

who makes Me his goal, who lovingly surrenders himself to Me, who is

nonattached (to My delusive cosmic-dream worlds), who bears ill will

toward none (beholding Me in all)—he enters My being.”9

1 Matthew 24:35.

2 “Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and

he shall go no more out” (Revelation 3:12).

3 Bhagavad Gita VII:3.

4 Bhagavad Gita VI:30.

5 “And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one

accord in one place....And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost....Others

mocking said, These men are full of new wine. But Peter, standing up with

the eleven, lifted up his voice, and said unto them...these are not drunken, as

ye suppose....But this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel; and it

shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out my Spirit upon

all flesh” (Acts 2:1–17).

6 In part, a free translation from the Gita XVIII:66 (see here).

7 “With sins obliterated, doubts removed, senses subjugated, the rishis

(sages), contributing to the welfare of mankind, attain emancipation in

Spirit” (Bhagavad Gita V:25).

8 Matthew 7:7.

9 Bhagavad Gita XI:55.

God as Light and Joy

Self-Realization Fellowship Hermitage, Encinitas, California, November

14, 1937

All nature is unreal. The supernatural is the only real Substance. Today I

was walking on the Hermitage grounds, beholding the sunshine all around

me. As I passed the stairway to the beach, I stopped and turned on the

electric stair-lights to see if they were working. But I could not see them;

for as I stood there the great light of God suddenly came and made it

impossible to distinguish lesser lights. Even the sun I could not see at all.

Vividly I understood that neither the sunlight nor the electric light is real.

The only true light is the light of God.

If there should rise

Suddenly within the skies

Sunburst of a thousand suns

Flooding earth with beams undeemed-of,

Then might be that Holy One’s

Majesty and radiance dreamed of.1

In that great vision He showed me worlds upon worlds—endless

manifestations of His light. These things that I beheld are but expressions of

His consciousness. And if we are attuned to Him, our perception is

limitless, pervading everywhere in the oceanic flow of the Divine Presence.

When the Spirit is known, and when we know ourselves as Spirit, there is

no land or sea, no earth or sky—all is He. The melting of everything in

Spirit is a state no one can describe. A great bliss is felt—eternal fullness of

joy and knowledge and love. I can see it in a devotee’s face if inwardly his

soul is trembling with that joy, as a leaf trembles in the wind. Such is the

yogi. This ecstasy can only be known by balancing the activity of ordinary

life with deep, soulful, undiscourageable meditation.

The Way to True Freedom

Egotism, pride, greed, anger, and other ugly outgrowths of self-centeredness

are barriers to spiritual development, preventing man’s escape from the

misery of soul ignorance. The right course is to follow the teachings of a

spiritual master who has wisdom and who loves God above all else, and to

tune in with the wishes of such a guru. That way leads to freedom. Your

wishes are guided by habits of past lives and by new habits you are

constantly creating. These hold the soul prisoner and make it impossible for

you to race along the road to everlasting liberty.

On one side of the path of life is the dark valley of ignorance, and on the

other side the eternal light of wisdom. When you follow the guidance of a

true guru, you will safely tread the road to freedom. Then everything that

you wish for will be born of wisdom, and will come to you without the

slightest effort. The whole universe has been created by the Divine Will,

and when you are attuned to it, whatever you want is accomplished just by

mere willing. I dare not even wish anymore, for I know that whatever is in

my mind will come to me.

The true devotee says, “Lord, I have no desires. I have found all that I want

in You; no other gain could be greater.2 Possessing His wisdom, love, and

joy, all desires of the heart are satisfied. That is a tremendous state. When

you are united with Spirit, you are king—a king of quietude and bliss, fully

satisfied and complete within your Self. In your oneness with Him, you see

the whole world standing before you, ready to do your bidding. Because

God made man in His image, all those who find Him find also that His will

in them fulfills their slightest command.

With God-Realization Comes All Power

So long as you have any desire to dominate other people, or to show them

how powerful you are spiritually or in any other way, you will not find soul

freedom. God-awareness begins in humbleness, love, and meditative bliss;

but with the realization of God comes all power. If the little wave knew that

behind it is the great ocean, it could say, “I am the ocean.” You should

realize that just behind your consciousness is the Ocean of God.

When Jesus was being crucified he could have reduced his enemies to ashes

with one look; but he didn’t do it. Instead, he forgave them. That is the

divine nature: peace, love, humbleness, omnipresence, omniscience. He

who becomes one with God has no need to prove to himself or to others the

extent of the power he possesses. He knows within that he has all power at

his command, and there is nothing to fear. But he uses his power only when

God directs him to do so.

The accomplished yogi is awake in his infinite nature and asleep in his

material nature.3 You should attain this self-mastery. Don’t fool yourself,

giving all your time to the world. Outwit the world and its lures: the best

way to conserve your time and use it to greatest benefit is to put your whole

mind on seeking God day and night, no matter what activities you engage in

outwardly.

The cow calmly grazing with its calf in the pasture does not show any sign

of worry about the calf, but if you go near it, the cow comes at you

immediately. So is the yogi, outwardly busy with his work but inwardly

keeping his attention always on the Lord.

Jesus said, “If thy hand offend thee, cut it off.”4 He didn’t mean that you

should maim your body, but rather that you should cut off enslaving sense

attachments, which prevent you from finding God. Like an insistent child,

constantly call to the Divine Mother until She says: “All right, what is it

you want?” She is so busy with creation, She doesn’t reply at once; but to

the naughty child who cries and cries for Her, She will come.

The Divine Mother is most anxious to have you back with Her, but first you

must prove to Her that you want Her alone. You must cry urgently and

unceasingly; then She smiles and is with you instantly. Divine Spirit has no

partiality; the Mother loves all. But Her devotees appreciate Her love,

respond to Her love. I see the effect on people who have gained a little

human love, or a little money—how happy they are! But if they could see

what strength, what joy, what love is in the Divine Mother, they would fly

away from all else.

God Speaks Only Through His Devotees

To the world God speaks only through His enlightened devotees. Therefore,

the wisest of all actions is to tune in with the will of the guru who is sent to

you by the Lord as a response to your soul’s desire. He is not a guru who is

self-proclaimed as such; he is a guru who is asked by God to bring others

back to Him. When there is a little spiritual desire, the Lord sends books

and teachers to further inspire you; and when your desire is stronger, he

sends a real guru. “Understand this! By surrendering thyself (to the guru),

by questioning (the guru and thine inner perception), and by service (to the

guru), the sages who have realized truth will impart that wisdom to thee.”5

There are teachers who expect their followers to be always at their beck and

call, ready to obey instantly; and if they don’t, the teacher becomes angry.

But a spiritual teacher who knows God and is truly a guru never thinks of

himself as a teacher at all. He beholds God’s presence in everyone, and

feels no resentment if some students disregard his wishes. The Hindu

scriptures say that those who tune in with the wisdom of a true guru make it

possible for the guru to help them. “Comprehending that wisdom from a

guru, thou, O Arjuna! wilt not again fall into delusion.”6

The friendship that exists between guru and disciple is eternal. There is

complete surrender, there is no compulsion, when a disciple accepts the

guru’s training.

Human friendship is often selfish; when a person ceases to be useful to us,

we lose our love for him. This is the defect of human love.

In friendship that is divine, love that is divine—not conditioned by material

forms but by spiritual law—there is a consciousness of mutual

responsibility. When you try to understand a person, it is easy to please him.

But when you don’t try to understand, it is impossible to keep harmony. I

can get along with strangers, but I can best help those who tune in with me.

I never would want to hurt anyone. I like to please all—not by sanctioning

their wrong desires, but by encouraging them in their right aspirations, that

they may really live in the consciousness of God.

God Is the Only Guru

One who loves God can never take pleasure in being a teacher. He knows

that God is the only Guru. I feel as the dust at your feet. This I say out of

the realization of that mighty Spirit I behold in each one of you.

I was to have gone from this earth a long time ago. I would like to melt this

body in the Divine Flame and burn the dross, so that the body is no more a

part of me that appears separate from the Infinite. One day I shall be gone,

but so long as I live on earth, my greatest pleasure is to tell those who tune

in with my wishes, and who trust me, that the only thing I want is to interest

them in that Light which has given me consolation and freedom and

assurance indescribable. “The Light of All Lights, beyond darkness....He is

seated in the hearts of all.”7

In that Light I see all those who have come and gone. I see all creation, and

events that happened many years ago. The history of the world is preserved

in the archives of the eternal sphere beyond. It is another dimension. Here

in this finite world we behold length, breadth, and thickness, but there is

another plane where the three dimensions do not exist; all is transparent.

Everything is consciousness. The sense of taste is consciousness. The sense

of smell is consciousness. Our feelings, our thoughts, and our body are

nothing but consciousness. Just as we can see, hear, smell, taste, and touch

in a dream, so in that higher sphere we experience all these sensations

through pure consciousness.

This is what I am seeing now even as I speak to you. I am not in this body; I

am a part of all that exists. These things I am beholding are just as real to

me as are you who are in this room. You have to awaken in order to

perceive that God is everywhere and to realize that you have been

dreaming. All of you are sitting here in this dream, and you are part of the

dream. Many times I see this room in Eternity, and other times I see

Eternity in this room. All things have borrowed life from that Eternal

Source.

I Cried and Prayed, Day and Night

Everything is God. This very room and the universe are floating like a

motion picture on the screen of my consciousness. When you look back at

the booth, you see only the beam of light that is projecting the pictures on

the screen. That this creation is naught but a motion picture, created out of

God’s light, seems incredible; but it is true. I look at this room and I see

nothing but pure Spirit, pure Light, pure Joy. “He dwells in the world,

enveloping all—everywhere.”8 The pictures of my body and your bodies

and all things in this world are only rays of light streaming out of that one

sacred Light. As I see that Light I behold nothing anywhere but pure

Spirit.9

It seems so simple now; but when as a boy I sat praying night after night, no

answer came. On one side I beheld unenlightened humanity and on the

other side Eternity, which would not speak to me. It was a very cruel state

—forsaken by God, I thought. But I was not forsaken by Him; He was

hiding behind my thoughts, behind my feelings all the time. When I began

to see the light within, my soul would be mysteriously filled with divine

fragrance; I would see revealed all the roots of trees and the sap flowing in

them. Then I began to feel the great Spirit near. Again and again I cried and

prayed, day and night, and when nothing any longer meant anything to me,

when inside I renounced everything—even happiness, lest it be material

happiness—then He came to me. Now He is with me evermore. The world

may forsake me, but He forsakes me never.

I don’t know why I am telling these things to you, but I feel I must do so. I

used to talk of them, but in the presence of those who became indifferent I

couldn’t speak—my mouth wouldn’t open. This time He has made me tell,

that you may know there is nothing to live for except Him. All else will go.

Pray only for That which is abiding.

Pray Only to Know God

Don’t yearn for human love; it will vanish. Behind human love is the

spiritual love of God. Seek that. Don’t pray for home or for money or for

love or for friendship. Don’t pray for anything of this world. Enjoy only

what the Lord gives to you. All else leads to delusion. Man has come on

earth solely to learn to know God; he is here for no other reason. This is the

true message of the Lord. To all those who seek and love Him, He tells of

that great Life where there is no pain, no old age, no war, no death—only

eternal assurance. In that Life nothing is destroyed. There is only ineffable

happiness that will never grow stale—a happiness always new.

So that is why it is worthwhile to seek God. All those who sincerely seek
Him will surely find Him. Those who want to love the Lord and yearn to
enter His kingdom, and who sincerely wish in their hearts to know Him,
will find Him. You must have an ever-increasing desire for Him, day and
night. He will acknowledge your love by fulfilling His promise to you
throughout eternity, and you shall know joy and happiness unending. All is
light, all is joy, all is peace, all is love. He is all.
1 Bhagavad Gita XI:12, Sir Edwin Arnold’s translation.
2 “The state that, once found, the yogi considers as the treasure beyond all
other treasures—anchored therein, he is immune to even the mightiest
grief” (Bhagavad Gita VI:22).
3 “That which is night (of slumber) to all creatures is (luminous)
wakefulness to the man of self-mastery. And what is wakefulness to
ordinary men, that is night (a time for slumber) to the divinely perceptive
sage” (Bhagavad Gita II:69).
4 Matthew 18:8.
5 Bhagavad Gita IV:34.
6 Bhagavad Gita IV:35.
7 Bhagavad Gita XIII:17.
8 Bhagavad Gita XIII:13.
9 Of such great lovers of God the Gita (VII:19) says: “After many
incarnations, the sage attains Me, realizing, ‘The Lord is all-pervading!’ A
man so illumined is hard to find.” (Publisher’s Note)

Have I Found God?

May 19381

This is the message of my heart to you. Mark it well. Read and inwardly

digest it, and put into practice the truths that God has expressed through me.

First, ask yourself: “Have I found God?” If your answer doesn’t satisfy you,

get busy sincerely with meditation, as taught by the Self-realized masters

who have found Him.

India’s saints experimented through the ages to perfect the universally

scientific yoga methods of emancipation, of attaining oneness with God.

For your own satisfaction, apply those methods in your spiritual seeking,

for you cannot find the Supreme without following the law of concentration

and meditation, which alone leads to Him. Material scientists are gathering

secrets from nature every day by applying the physical laws that lead to

discovery. Without similarly utilizing spiritual laws, dogmatic theology

becomes stagnant, powerless to open the doors to God.

Absentminded prayers and affirmations, and untested decrees and beliefs

will not give you God. The step-by-step yoga techniques of Self-realization,

the help of a guru (one who has traveled beyond the forest of theology and

knows God), and daily deep effort in yoga meditation will lead you to the

Divine Goal. In the Gita we find the testimony of the Lord Himself: “Thou

canst not see Me with mortal eyes. Therefore I give thee sight divine.

Behold My supreme power of yoga.”2

To reach God you must find some time every day to be alone with Him; you

must get away from too many distractions, too many fruitless engagements,

too many desires, too much waste of time; and you must follow a spiritually

awakened teacher who has found Him. Use your common sense and

intuition to recognize the true teachers who know Him. Those alone who

have experienced God can lead you to Him.

Use the night hours as much as you can, and the early morning, and all free

moments between demanding duties, to pray inwardly to God with all your

soul: “Reveal Thyself!” Solitude is the price of God-realization. Wake!

Waste no more time in blind believing; follow the tested methods of

attaining Self-realization, and know God.

1 This selection was written by Paramahansa Yogananda. We have included

it in this compilation of talks because it expresses one of the most important

aspects of his universal message to mankind: “It is not what you read that

can give you liberation, but what you do with what you read. Salvation

comes from practice, not theory; realization, not blind belief.” (Publisher’s

Note)

2 Bhagavad Gita XI:8.

The Purpose of Life Is to Find God

Self-Realization Fellowship Temple, Hollywood, California, October 8,

1944

I am working for God alone. Earth has no illusions for me; I have seen

through them all. You too should realize that you are visiting this earth only

temporarily; you are here solely to learn necessary lessons and to help all

who cross your path. You do not know why you have been cast in a

particular role, so you must learn what God expects of you. Don’t harbor

personal desires; your only desire should be to follow the Lord’s will and to

live and work for Him.

We are here today, tomorrow we are gone: mere shadows in a cosmic

dream. But behind the unreality of these fleeting pictures is the immortal

reality of Spirit. Life here on earth appears futile and chaotic until we are

anchored in the Divine.

This is why, as I have often told you, I am here to testify to the supreme

importance of Spirit. Do not concentrate upon ephemeral worldly goals and

human attachments. Such fanaticism takes your mind away from the Lord

and your eternal Self in Him. “He who has overcome attachment both to

sense objects and to actions, and who is free from ego-instigated plannings

—that man is said to have attained firm union of soul with Spirit.”1

You came here through the will of God, but He gave you freedom to live

according to your own will. You should learn now to be obedient to the will

of the Almighty. This is how I try to be. Every morning I ask Him to tell me

what He wants me to do; then I see Him working through my hands and

brain, and everything goes as He wishes.

That is the Power you should trust, the Power through which you can find

guidance, happiness, strength, and freedom. That is the Power which will

give you emancipation.

No other duty is important if it takes your thought and desire away from

your duty to God; all else is illusion. To grasp this truth I had to remove all

worldly hallucinations from my brain, through meditation and the company

of great masters. I want to instill this understanding in your hearts: until you

realize that God is more important than anything else, and until you spend

your life in seeking to please Him, you are not spiritually evolved at all.

To Ignore God Is Not Common Sense

Is it not true wisdom to do His will and to be directly helpful in bringing

others back to Him? My greatest joy is to remind others of the importance

and necessity of remembering God. This earth is a foreign land; we are not

in our own Home. In an instant you may be required to leave this world;

you will have to cancel all your engagements. Why then give any other

activity first importance, with the result that you have no time for God?

That is not common sense. It is because of maya, the net of cosmic delusion

which is thrown over us, that we entangle ourselves in mundane interests

and forget the Lord.

Jesus said: “If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee:

for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not

that thy whole body should be cast into hell.”2

He was speaking not literally but metaphorically; it is only if the mind has

become enmeshed in wrong desires that any of the senses can offend the

divine soul image within man. Christ meant that so long as wrong desires

lead the senses astray, we shall remain oblivious of God, in whom our real

happiness lies. Therefore it is better, he said, to be maimed of the senses

than to misuse them. Christ spoke in a dramatic way to point out that

nothing in life, not even the body, is of any value if we remain in ignorance

of God. Without knowing Him, life becomes a “hell”—a hornet’s nest of

troubles. There is no security in this world; one never knows from what

quarter disaster may strike.

A man with cancer lies in the hospital. “Well,” you say, “that is not I; it is

somebody else.” But I have mentally put myself in such bodies and I know

how hopeless those people feel. While you are well and strong, do not

spend your time on foolishness. God understands everything; He knows He

has sent us to this terrible place. He grieves in His heart at our sufferings.

Nothing hurts Him more than to see us grovel in the mud of delusion. He

wants us to come back Home. And to those who make the effort to know

Him, He responds: “From sheer compassion I, the Divine Indweller, set

alight in them the radiant lamp of wisdom which banishes the darkness that

is born of ignorance.”3

For every man who retraces his steps to God, there is a great celebration

among the angels. They actually appear and receive that returning soul in

great joy.

There is no way back Home if you weave around you a snare of worldly

desires. You came to play your part on the stage of time, to fill the role that

you were designed for in the divine drama; but the essential part of your

role is to think of Him and to do His will, naught else. Every thought, every

act, is deluded that does not place Him first. The Hindu scriptures say: “As

soon as you feel the desire for God, immediately change your life and

plunge into Him.”

Each soul must find its way back alone. No one but you is responsible for

your mistakes and habits. Once you have found your Self in your soul, you

are free. But so long as you are not free, so long there is danger; you will

have to come back to earth and work out all the desires that remain

unfinished.4 Your body is mortal but the soul outlasts the body. If you die

wanting a Cadillac you will have to come back here for it; you will not be

able to get it in heaven, where cars are not used.

Although the force of desires is strong, the potency of Divine Will is

stronger. That Will is in you and will work through you, if you permit it,

and if you refuse to let worldly motivations weave nets of incarnations

around you.

Seek God while you are young and strong, because in old age and disease

you may not be able to seek Him. By the time most people begin to

understand the true meaning of life, the body is weakening; they have to

spend their time looking after the frail physical machine instead of pursuing

the search for Reality.

The only purpose of life is to find God. If you are married, you and your

loved one should seek the Divine together. But if you are unmarried, obey

at once Christ’s command: “Seek ye first the kingdom of God.” When you

know Him, He will tell you what to do. Otherwise, you don’t know what

fate may await you in marriage. The tragic stories that come to my ears are

unimaginable! Terrible tales of human incompatibility. People should be

taught in youth how to control their emotions. I don’t think anyone should

marry without first having learned to control his impulses. Until one is

emotionally stable, he is not fit to have a family. The greatest thing is to

possess self-control; then, if you want to marry, the right person will be

drawn magnetically into your life.

Ignorance is like a great poison in the system. Because of it we don’t realize

our true nature, made in the image of God. First of all, find out by ceaseless

prayer what the Lord wants you to do. There is nothing greater than

obeying His will. It is your desires that enslave you and make you think, “I

want this” or “I want that.” Do not act on what your enemy, the ego,

dictates; seek rather to do the will of the Heavenly Father, your sole Friend.

So long as ignorance remains, you cannot tell how many incarnations of

suffering may be ahead of you. Eliminate ignorance by meditation. The

longer you meditate, the more completely you will “cauterize” the injurious

mental bacteria that have been infecting you for ages. For instance, some

people are prone to anger; they do not realize that they have been

cultivating the habit of wrathfulness for many lives. Others are slaves to the

sex instinct as a result of bad habits for incarnations. It is best to struggle to

get rid of bad habits now. “Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the

temple of my God, and he shall go no more out (reincarnate no more).”5

Daily say with me to the Lord: “I am working for You. Whenever You want

to take me, I am ready. I am Your child.” He will give you the same

freedom I am enjoying. I take on more and more work but I never feel I am

overburdened, because I do everything for Him. I love Him. That surrender

to God has destroyed in me the karma of ignorance. So long as there is a

weeping brother by the wayside, I will come again into this world to wipe

away his tears. Why should I be content to enjoy the blessings of heaven

while others are suffering?

The Romance of Divine Love

Reform your life. Every night commune with Him; talk to Him; pray to

Him sincerely. Give up the mockery of half-hearted prayer. Say, “Lord, I

know You are here. You must talk to me! Come out of the cave of silence.”

This prayer is expressed in a song I wrote to the Divine Mother when I

visited the desert near Palm Springs:

Mother, I give You my soul call!

You can’t remain hidden any more.

Come out of the silent sky,

Come out of the mountain glen,

Come out of my secret soul,

Come out of my cave of silence.

I had just finished the song when I saw a wondrous form, the Divine

Mother! appear from out of the sky. In response to my soul call, I beheld

everywhere, in everything, the Cosmic Mother. I prayed and worshiped Her.

She blessed me and talked with me.

The greatest romance is with the Infinite. You have no idea how beautiful

life can be. “Unattracted to the sensory world, the yogi experiences the ever

new joy inherent in the Self. Engaged in divine union of the soul with

Spirit, he attains bliss indestructible” (Bhagavad Gita V:21). When you

suddenly find God everywhere, when He comes and talks to you and guides

you, the romance of divine love has begun.

1 Bhagavad Gita VI:4.

2 Matthew 5:29.

3 Bhagavad Gita X:11.

4 Desires may be worked out by material fulfillment or, according to one’s

spiritual development, by the mental process of discrimination or the

spiritual process of deep meditation.

5 Revelation 3:12.

GOD! GOD! GOD! (poem)

By Paramahansa Yogananda

From the depths of slumber,

As I ascend the spiral stairway of wakefulness,

I whisper:

God! God! God!

Thou art the food, and when I break my fast

Of nightly separation from Thee,

I taste Thee, and mentally say:

God! God! God!

No matter where I go, the spotlight of my mind

Ever keeps turning on Thee;

And in the battle din of activity my silent war-cry is ever:

God! God! God!

When boisterous storms of trials shriek

And worries howl at me,

I drown their noises, loudly chanting:

God! God! God!

When my mind weaves dreams

With threads of memories,

On that magic cloth I do emboss:

God! God! God!

Every night, in time of deepest sleep,

My peace dreams and calls: Joy! Joy! Joy!

And my joy comes singing evermore:

God! God! God!

In waking, eating, working, dreaming, sleeping,

Serving, meditating, chanting, divinely loving,

My soul constantly hums, unheard by any:

God! God! God!

Paramahansa Yogananda: A Yogi in Life and

Death

Paramahansa Yogananda entered mahasamadhi (a yogi’s final conscious

exit from the body) in Los Angeles, California, on March 7, 1952, after

concluding his speech at a banquet held in honor of H. E. Binay R. Sen,

Ambassador of India.

The great world teacher demonstrated the value of yoga (scientific

techniques for God-realization) not only in life but in death. Weeks after his

departure his unchanged face shone with the divine luster of

incorruptibility.

Mr. Harry T. Rowe, Los Angeles Mortuary Director, Forest Lawn

Memorial-Park (in which the body of the great master is temporarily

placed), sent Self-Realization Fellowship a notarized letter from which the

following extracts are taken:

“The absence of any visual signs of decay in the dead body of Paramahansa

Yogananda offers the most extraordinary case in our experience….No

physical disintegration was visible in his body even twenty days after

death….No indication of mold was visible on his skin, and no visible

desiccation (drying up) took place in the bodily tissues. This state of perfect

preservation of a body is, so far as we know from mortuary annals, an

unparalleled one….At the time of receiving Yogananda’s body, the

Mortuary personnel expected to observe, through the glass lid of the casket,

the usual progressive signs of bodily decay. Our astonishment increased as

day followed day without bringing any visible change in the body under

observation. Yogananda’s body was apparently in a phenomenal state of

immutability….

“No odor of decay emanated from his body at any time….The physical

appearance of Yogananda on March 27th, just before the bronze cover of

the casket was put into position, was the same as it had been on March 7th.

He looked on March 27th as fresh and as unravaged by decay as he had

looked on the night of his death. On March 27th there was no reason to say

that his body had suffered any visible physical disintegration at all. For

these reasons we state again that the case of Paramahansa Yogananda is

unique in our experience.”

In 1977, on the twenty-fifth anniversary of the mahasamadhi of

Paramahansa Yogananda, the Government of India issued this

commemorative stamp in his honor. With the stamp, the government

published a descriptive leaflet, which read, in part:

The ideal of love for God and service to humanity found full expression in

the life of Paramahansa Yogananda….Though the major part of his life was

spent outside of India, still he takes his place among our great saints. His

work continues to grow and shine ever more brightly, drawing people

everywhere on the path of the pilgrimage of the Spirit.

Additional Resources on the Kriya Yoga

Teachings of Paramahansa Yogananda

Self-Realization Fellowship is dedicated to freely assisting seekers

worldwide. For information regarding our annual series of public lectures

and classes, meditation and inspirational services at our temples and centers

around the world, a schedule of retreats, and other activities, we invite you

to visit our website or contact our International Headquarters:

www.yogananda-srf.org

Self-Realization Fellowship

3880 San Rafael Avenue

Los Angeles, CA 90065-3219

(323) 225-2471

Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons

Personal guidance and instruction from Paramahansa Yogananda on the

techniques of yoga meditation and principles of spiritual living

If you feel drawn to the spiritual teachings of Paramahansa Yogananda, we

invite you to enroll in the Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons.

Paramahansa Yogananda originated this home-study series to provide

sincere seekers the opportunity to learn and practice the ancient yoga

meditation techniques that he brought to the West—including the science of

Kriya Yoga. The Lessons also present his practical guidance for attaining

balanced physical, mental, and spiritual well-being.

The Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons are available at a nominal fee (to

cover printing and postage costs). All students are freely given personal

guidance in their practice by Self-Realization Fellowship monks and nuns.

For more information…

Complete details about the Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons are

included in the free booklet Undreamed-of Possibilities. To receive a copy

of this booklet and an application form, please visit our website or contact

our International Headquarters.

Also published by Self-Realization Fellowship

Autobiography of a Yogi

By Paramahansa Yogananda

This acclaimed autobiography presents a fascinating portrait of one of the

great spiritual figures of our time. With engaging candor, eloquence, and

wit, Paramahansa Yogananda narrates the inspiring chronicle of his life—

the experiences of his remarkable childhood, encounters with many saints

and sages during his youthful search throughout India for an illumined

teacher, ten years of training in the hermitage of a revered yoga master, and

the thirty years that he lived and taught in America. Also recorded here are

his meetings with Mahatma Gandhi, Rabindranath Tagore, Luther Burbank,

the Catholic stigmatist Therese Neumann, and other celebrated spiritual

personalities of East and West.

Autobiography of a Yogi is at once a beautifully written account of an

exceptional life and a profound introduction to the ancient science of Yoga

and its time-honored tradition of meditation. The author clearly explains the

subtle but definite laws behind both the ordinary events of everyday life and

the extraordinary events commonly termed miracles. His absorbing life

story thus becomes the background for a penetrating and unforgettable look

at the ultimate mysteries of human existence.

Considered a modern spiritual classic, the book has been translated into

more than forty languages and is widely used as a text and reference work

in colleges and universities. A perennial best seller since it was first

published in 1946, Autobiography of a Yogi has found its way into the

hearts of millions of readers around the world.

“A rare account.”

—THE NEW YORK TIMES

“A fascinating and clearly annotated study.”

—NEWSWEEK

“There has been nothing before, written in English or in any other European

language, like this presentation of Yoga.”

—COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS

Other Books by Paramahansa Yogananda

Available at bookstores or online at

www.srfbooks.org

God Talks With Arjuna: The Bhagavad Gita—A New Translation and

Commentary

In this monumental two-volume work, Paramahansa Yogananda reveals the

innermost essence of India’s most renowned scripture. Exploring its

psychological, spiritual, and metaphysical depths, he presents a sweeping

chronicle of the soul’s journey to enlightenment through the royal science

of God-realization.

The Second Coming of Christ: The Resurrection of the Christ Within You

—A revelatory commentary on the original teachings of Jesus

In this unprecedented masterwork of inspiration, almost 1700 pages in

length, Paramahansa Yogananda takes the reader on a profoundly enriching

journey through the four Gospels. Verse by verse, he illumines the universal

path to oneness with God taught by Jesus to his immediate disciples but

obscured through centuries of misinterpretation: “how to become like

Christ, how to resurrect the Eternal Christ within one’s self.”

The Divine Romance

Volume II of Paramahansa Yogananda’s collected talks and essays. Among

the wide-ranging selections: How to Cultivate Divine Love; Harmonizing

Physical, Mental, and Spiritual Methods of Healing; A World Without

Boundaries; Controlling Your Destiny; The Yoga Art of Overcoming

Mortal Consciousness and Death; The Cosmic Lover; Finding the Joy in

Life.

Journey to Self-realization

Volume III of the collected talks and essays presents Sri Yogananda’s

unique combination of wisdom, compassion, down-to-earth guidance, and

encouragement on dozens of fascinating subjects, including: Quickening

Human Evolution, How to Express Everlasting Youthfulness, and Realizing

God in Your Daily Life.

Wine of the Mystic: The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam—A Spiritual

Interpretation

An inspired commentary that brings to light the mystical science of God-

communion hidden behind the Rubaiyat’s enigmatic imagery. Includes 50

original color illustrations. Winner of the 1995 Benjamin Franklin Award

for best book in the field of religion.

Where There Is Light: Insight and Inspiration for Meeting Life’s Challenges

Gems of thought arranged by subject; a unique handbook to which readers

can quickly turn for a reassuring sense of direction in times of uncertainty

or crisis, or for a renewed awareness of the ever present power of God one

can draw upon in daily life.

Whispers from Eternity

A collection of Paramahansa Yogananda’s prayers and divine experiences in

the elevated states of meditation. Expressed in a majestic rhythm and poetic

beauty, his words reveal the inexhaustible variety of God’s nature, and the

infinite sweetness with which He responds to those who seek Him.

The Science of Religion

Within every human being, Paramahansa Yogananda writes, there is one

inescapable desire: to overcome suffering and attain a happiness that does

not end. Explaining how it is possible to fulfill these longings, he examines

the relative effectiveness of the different approaches to this goal.

The Yoga of the Bhagavad Gita: An Introduction to India’s Universal

Science of God-Realization

A compilation of selections from Paramahansa Yogananda’s in-depth,

critically acclaimed translation of and commentary on the Bhagavad Gita,

God Talks With Arjuna, this book presents truth-seekers with an ideal

introduction to the Gita’s timeless and universal teachings. Contains

Yogananda’s complete translation of the Bhagavad Gita, presented for the

first time in uninterrupted sequential form.

The Yoga of Jesus: Understanding the Hidden Teachings of the Gospels

A selection of material from Paramahansa Yogananda’s highly praised two-

volume work, The Second Coming of Christ, this concise book confirms

that Jesus, like the ancient sages and masters of the East, not only knew the

principles of yoga but taught this universal science of God-realization to his

disciples. Sri Yogananda shows that Jesus’ message is not about sectarian

divisiveness, but a unifying path by which seekers of all faith traditions can

enter the kingdom of God.

In the Sanctuary of the Soul: A Guide to Effective Prayer

Compiled from the works of Paramahansa Yogananda, this inspiring

devotional companion reveals ways of making prayer a daily source of

love, strength, and guidance.

Inner Peace: How to Be Calmly Active and Actively Calm

A practical and inspiring guide, compiled from the talks and writings of

Paramahansa Yogananda, that demonstrates how we can be “actively calm”

by creating peace through meditation, and “calmly active”—centered in the

stillness and joy of our own essential nature while living a dynamic,

fulfilling, and balanced life. Winner of the 2000 Benjamin Franklin Award

—best book in the field of Metaphysics/Spirituality.

How You Can Talk With God

Defining God as both the transcendent, universal Spirit and the intimately

personal Father, Mother, Friend, and Lover of all, Paramahansa Yogananda

shows how close the Lord is to each one of us, and how He can be

persuaded to “break His silence” and respond in a tangible way.

Metaphysical Meditations

More than 300 spiritually uplifting meditations, prayers, and affirmations

that can be used to develop greater health and vitality, creativity, self-

confidence, and calmness; and to live more fully in a conscious awareness

of the blissful presence of God.

Scientific Healing Affirmations

Paramahansa Yogananda presents here a profound explanation of the

science of affirmation. He makes clear why affirmations work, and how to

use the power of word and thought not only to bring about healing but to

effect desired change in every area of life. Includes a wide variety of

affirmations.

Sayings of Paramahansa Yogananda

A collection of sayings and wise counsel that conveys Paramahansa

Yogananda’s candid and loving responses to those who came to him for

guidance. Recorded by a number of his close disciples, the anecdotes in this

book give the reader an opportunity to share in their personal encounters

with the Master.

Songs of the Soul

Mystical poetry by Paramahansa Yogananda—an outpouring of his direct

perceptions of God in the beauties of nature, in man, in everyday

experiences, and in the spiritually awakened state of samadhi meditation.

The Law of Success

Explains dynamic principles for achieving one’s goals in life, and outlines

the universal laws that bring success and fulfillment—personal,

professional, and spiritual.

Cosmic Chants: Spiritualized Songs for Divine Communion

Words and music to 60 songs of devotion, with an introduction explaining

how spiritual chanting can lead to God-communion.

Audio Recordings of Paramahansa Yogananda

• Beholding the One in All

• Awake in the Cosmic Dream

• Be a Smile Millionaire

• The Great Light of God

• To Make Heaven on Earth

• One Life Versus Reincarnation

• Removing All Sorrow and Suffering

• In the Glory of the Spirit

• Follow the Path of Christ, Krishna, and the Masters

• Self-Realization: The Inner and the Outer Path

• Songs of My Heart

Other Publications From Self-Realization Fellowship

The Holy Science by Swami Sri Yukteswar

Only Love: Living the Spiritual Life in a Changing World by Sri Daya Mata

Finding the Joy Within You: Personal Counsel for God-Centered Living by

Sri Daya Mata

Enter the Quiet Heart: Creating a Loving Relationship With God by Sri

Daya Mata

God Alone: The Life and Letters of a Saint by Sri Gyanamata

“Mejda”: The Family and the Early Life of Paramahansa Yogananda by

Sananda Lal Ghosh

Self-Realization (a quarterly magazine founded by Paramahansa Yogananda

in 1925)

DVD Video

Awake: The Life of Yogananda

A film by CounterPoint Films

A complete catalog of books and audio/video recordings— including rare

archival recordings of Paramahansa Yogananda—is available at

www.srfbooks.org.

Free Introductory Booklet:

Undreamed-of Possibilities

The scientific techniques of meditation taught by Paramahansa Yogananda,

including Kriya Yoga—as well as his guidance on all aspects of balanced

spiritual living—are presented in the Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons.

For further information, please see the free booklet Undreamed-of

Possibilities.

SELF-REALIZATION FELLOWSHIP

3880 San Rafael Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90065-3219

Tel (323) 225-2471 • Fax (323) 225-5088

www.yogananda-srf.org

Aims and Ideals of Self-Realization Fellowship

As set forth by Paramahansa Yogananda, Founder

Sri Mrinalini Mata, President

To disseminate among the nations a knowledge of definite scientific

techniques for attaining direct personal experience of God.

To teach that the purpose of life is the evolution, through self-effort, of

man’s limited mortal consciousness into God Consciousness; and to this

end to establish Self-Realization Fellowship temples for God-communion

throughout the world, and to encourage the establishment of individual

temples of God in the homes and in the hearts of men.

To reveal the complete harmony and basic oneness of original Christianity

as taught by Jesus Christ and original Yoga as taught by Bhagavan Krishna;

and to show that these principles of truth are the common scientific

foundation of all true religions.

To point out the one divine highway to which all paths of true religious

beliefs eventually lead: the highway of daily, scientific, devotional

meditation on God.

To liberate man from his threefold suffering: physical disease, mental

inharmonies, and spiritual ignorance.

To encourage “plain living and high thinking”; and to spread a spirit of

brotherhood among all peoples by teaching the eternal basis of their unity:

kinship with God.

To demonstrate the superiority of mind over body, of soul over mind.

To overcome evil by good, sorrow by joy, cruelty by kindness, ignorance by

wisdom.

To unite science and religion through realization of the unity of their

underlying principles.

To advocate cultural and spiritual understanding between East and West,

and the exchange of their finest distinctive features.

To serve mankind as one’s larger Self.

Glossary

Arjuna. The exalted disciple to whom Bhagavan Krishna imparted the

immortal message of the Bhagavad Gita (q.v.); one of the five Pandava

princes in the great Hindu epic, the Mahabharata, in which he was a key

figure.

ashram. A spiritual hermitage; often a monastery.

astral body. Man’s subtle body of light, prana or lifetrons; the second of

three sheaths that successively encase the soul: the causal body (q.v.), the

astral body, and the physical body. The powers of the astral body enliven

the physical body, much as electricity illumines a bulb. The astral body has

nineteen elements: intelligence, ego, feeling, mind (sense-consciousness);

five instruments of knowledge (the sensory powers within the physical

organs of sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch); five instruments of action

(the executive powers in the physical instruments of procreation, excretion,

speech, locomotion, and the exercise of manual skill); and five instruments

of life force that perform the functions of circulation, metabolization,

assimilation, crystallization, and elimination.

astral light. The subtle light emanating from lifetrons (see prana); the

structural essence of the astral world. Through the all-inclusive intuitive

perception of the soul, devotees in concentrated states of meditation may

perceive the astral light, particularly as the spiritual eye (q.v.).

astral world. The subtle sphere of the Lord’s creation, a universe of light

and color composed of finer-than-atomic forces, i.e., vibrations of life

energy or lifetrons (see prana). Every being, every object, every vibration

on the material plane has an astral counterpart, for in the astral universe

(heaven) is the blueprint of our material universe. At physical death, the

soul of man, clothed in an astral body of light, ascends to one of the higher

or lower astral planes, according to merit, to continue his spiritual evolution

in the greater freedom of that subtle realm. There he remains for a

karmically predetermined time until physical rebirth.

Aum (Om). The Sanskrit root word or seed-sound symbolizing that aspect

of Godhead which creates and sustains all things; Cosmic Vibration. Aum

of the Vedas became the sacred word Hum of the Tibetans; Amin of the

Moslems; and Amen of the Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Jews, and

Christians. The world’s great religions state that all created things originate

in the cosmic vibratory energy of Aum or Amen, the Word or Holy Ghost.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word

was God....All things were made by him [the Word or Aum]; and without

him was not any thing made that was made” (John 1:1,3).

Amen in Hebrew means sure, faithful. “These things saith the Amen, the

faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God” (Revelation

3:14). Even as sound is produced by the vibration of a running motor, so the

omnipresent sound of Aum faithfully testifies to the running of the “Cosmic

Motor,” which upholds all life and every particle of creation through

vibratory energy. In the Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons (q.v.),

Paramahansa Yogananda teaches techniques of meditation whose practice

brings direct experience of God as Aum or Holy Ghost. That blissful

communion with the invisible divine Power (“the Comforter, which is the

Holy Ghost”—John 14:26) is the truly scientific basis of prayer.

avatar. Divine incarnation; from the Sanskrit avatara, with roots ava,

“down,” and tri, “to pass.” One who attains union with Spirit and then

returns to earth to help mankind is called an avatar.

avidya. Literally, “non-knowledge,” ignorance; the manifestation in man of

maya, the cosmic delusion (q.v.). Essentially, avidya is man’s ignorance of

his divine nature and of the sole reality: Spirit.

Babaji. See Mahavatar Babaji.

Bhagavad Gita. “Song of the Lord.” An ancient Indian scripture consisting

of eighteen chapters from the Mahabharata epic. Presented in the form of a

dialogue between the avatar (q.v.) Lord Krishna and his disciple Arjuna on

the eve of the historic battle of Kurukshetra, the Gita is a profound treatise

on the science of Yoga (union with God) and a timeless prescription for

happiness and success in everyday living. The Gita is allegory as well as

history, a spiritual dissertation on the inner battle between man’s good and

bad tendencies. Depending on the context, Krishna symbolizes the guru, the

soul, or God; Arjuna represents the aspiring devotee. Of this universal

scripture Mahatma Gandhi wrote: “Those who will meditate on the Gita

will derive fresh joy and new meanings from it every day. There is not a

single spiritual tangle which the Gita cannot unravel.”

Unless otherwise indicated, the quotations from the Bhagavad Gita in this

volume are from Paramahansa Yogananda’s own translations, which he

rendered from the Sanskrit sometimes literally and sometimes in

paraphrase, depending on the context of his talk. For most Gita quotations

in this reprinting of Man’s Eternal Quest, the version used is the definitive

one given by Paramahansaji for his comprehensive translation and

commentary: God Talks With Arjuna: The Bhagavad Gita—Royal Science

of God-Realization (published by Self-Realization Fellowship in 1995). In

talks where he was rendering a Gita passage more freely in order to

emphasize a specific point, the paraphrase has been retained and noted as

such in the footnote citation.

Bhagavan Krishna. An avatar (q.v.) who lived in ancient India ages before

the Christian era. One of the meanings given for the word Krishna in the

Hindu scriptures is “Omniscient Spirit.” Thus, Krishna, like Christ, is a

spiritual title signifying the divine magnitude of the avatar—his oneness

with God. The title Bhagavan means “Lord.” At the time he gave the

discourse recorded in the Bhagavad Gita, Lord Krishna was ruler of a

kingdom in northern India. In his early life, Krishna lived as a cowherd who

enchanted his companions with the music of his flute. In this role Krishna is

often considered to represent allegorically the soul playing the flute of

meditation to guide all misled thoughts back to the fold of omniscience.

Bhakti Yoga. The spiritual approach to God that stresses all-surrendering

love as the principal means for communion and union with God. See Yoga.

Brahma-Vishnu-Shiva. Three aspects of God’s immanence in creation.

They represent that triune function of the Christ Intelligence (Tat) that

guides Cosmic Nature’s activities of creation, preservation, and dissolution.

See Trinity.

Brahman (Brahma). Absolute Spirit.

breath. “The influx of innumerable cosmic currents into man by way of the

breath induces restlessness in his mind,” Paramahansa Yogananda wrote.

“Thus the breath links him with the fleeting phenomenal worlds. To escape

from the sorrows of transitoriness and to enter the blissful realm of Reality,

the yogi learns to quiet the breath by scientific meditation.”

caste. Caste in its original conception was not a hereditary status, but a

classification based on man’s natural capacities. In his evolution, man

passes through four distinct grades, designated by ancient Hindu sages as

Sudra, Vaisya, Kshatriya, and Brahmin. The Sudra is interested primarily in

satisfying his bodily needs and desires; the work that best suits his state of

development is bodily labor. The Vaisya is ambitious for worldly gain as

well as for satisfaction of the senses; he has more creative ability than the

Sudra and seeks occupation as a farmer, a businessman, an artist, or

wherever his mental energy finds fulfillment. The Kshatriya, having

through many lives fulfilled the desires of the Sudra and Vaisya states,

begins to seek the meaning of life; he tries to overcome his bad habits, to

control his senses, and to do what is right. Kshatriyas by occupation are

noble rulers, statesmen, warriors. The Brahmin has overcome his lower

nature, has a natural affinity for spiritual pursuits, and is God-knowing, able

therefore to teach and help liberate others.

causal body. Essentially, man as a soul is a causal-bodied being. His causal

body is an idea-matrix for the astral and physical bodies. The causal body is

composed of 35 idea elements corresponding to the 19 elements of the

astral body plus the 16 basic material elements of the physical body.

causal world. Behind the physical world of matter (atoms, protons,

electrons), and the subtle astral world of luminous life energy (lifetrons), is

the causal, or ideational, world of thought (thoughtrons). After man evolves

sufficiently to transcend the physical and astral universes, he resides in the

causal universe. In the consciousness of causal beings, the physical and

astral universes are resolved to their thought essence. Whatever physical

man can do in imagination, causal man can do in actuality—the only

limitation being thought itself. Ultimately, man sheds the last soul covering

—his causal body—to unite with omnipresent Spirit, beyond all vibratory

realms.

chakras. In Yoga, the seven occult centers of life and consciousness in the

spine and brain, which enliven the physical and astral bodies of man. These

centers are referred to as chakras (“wheels”) because the concentrated

energy in each one is like a hub from which radiate rays of life-giving light

and energy. In ascending order, these chakras are muladhara (the coccygeal,

at the base of the spine); svadhisthana (the sacral, two inches above

muladhara); manipura (the lumbar, opposite the navel); anahata (the dorsal,

opposite the heart); vishuddha (the cervical, at the base of the neck); ajna

(traditionally located between the eyebrows; in actuality, directly connected

by polarity with the medulla; see also medulla and spiritual eye); and

sahasrara (in the uppermost part of the cerebrum).

The seven centers are divinely planned exits or “trap doors” through which

the soul has descended into the body and through which it must reascend by

a process of meditation. By seven successive steps, the soul escapes into

Cosmic Consciousness. In its conscious upward passage through the seven

opened or “awakened” cerebrospinal centers, the soul travels the highway

to the Infinite, the true path by which the soul must retrace its course to

reunite with God.

Yoga treatises generally consider only the six lower centers as chakras, with

sahasrara referred to separately as a seventh center. All seven centers,

however, are often referred to as lotuses, whose petals open, or turn upward,

in spiritual awakening as the life and consciousness travel up the spine.

chitta. Intuitive feeling; the aggregate of consciousness, inherent in which is

ahamkara (egoity), buddhi (intelligence), and manas (mind or sense

consciousness).

Christ center. The Kutastha or ajna chakra at the point between the

eyebrows, directly connected by polarity with the medulla (q.v.); center of

will and concentration, and of Christ Consciousness (q.v.); seat of the

spiritual eye (q.v.).

Christ Consciousness. “Christ” or “Christ Consciousness” is the projected

consciousness of God immanent in all creation. In Christian scripture it is

called the “only begotten son,” the only pure reflection in creation of God

the Father; in Hindu scripture it is called Kutastha Chaitanya or Tat, the

cosmic intelligence of Spirit everywhere present in creation. It is the

universal consciousness, oneness with God, manifested by Jesus, Krishna,

and other avatars. Great saints and yogis know it as the state of samadhi

(q.v.) meditation wherein their consciousness has become identified with

the intelligence in every particle of creation; they feel the entire universe as

their own body. See Trinity.

Concentration Technique. The Self-Realization Fellowship Technique of

Concentration (also Hong-Sau Technique) taught in the Self-Realization

Fellowship Lessons. This technique helps scientifically to withdraw the

attention from all objects of distraction and to place it upon one thing at a

time. Thus it is invaluable for meditation, concentration on God. The Hong-

Sau Technique is an integral part of the science of Kriya Yoga (q.v.).

consciousness, states of. In mortal consciousness man experiences three

states: waking consciousness, sleeping consciousness, and dreaming

consciousness. But he does not experience his soul, superconsciousness,

and he does not experience God. The Christ-man does. As mortal man is

conscious throughout his body, so the Christ-man is conscious throughout

the universe, which he feels as his body. Beyond the state of Christ

consciousness is cosmic consciousness, the experience of oneness with God

in His absolute consciousness beyond vibratory creation as well as with the

Lord’s omnipresence manifesting in the phenomenal worlds.

Cosmic Consciousness. The Absolute; Spirit beyond creation. Also the

samadhi-meditation state of oneness with God both beyond and within

vibratory creation. See Trinity.

cosmic delusion. See maya.

cosmic energy. See prana.

Cosmic Intelligent Vibration. See Aum.

Cosmic Sound. See Aum.

dharma. Eternal principles of righteousness that uphold all creation; man’s

inherent duty to live in harmony with these principles. See also Sanatana

Dharma.

diksha. Spiritual initiation; from the Sanskrit verb-root diksh, to dedicate

oneself. See also disciple and Kriya Yoga.

disciple. A spiritual aspirant who comes to a guru seeking introduction to

God, and to this end establishes an eternal spiritual relationship with the

guru. In Self-Realization Fellowship, the guru-disciple relationship is

established by diksha, initiation, in Kriya Yoga. See also guru and Kriya

Yoga.

Divine Mother. The aspect of God that is active in creation; the shakti, or

power, of the Transcendent Creator. Other terms for this aspect of Divinity

are Nature or Prakriti, Aum, Holy Ghost, Cosmic Intelligent Vibration.

Also, the personal aspect of God as Mother, embodying the Lord’s love and

compassionate qualities.

The Hindu scriptures teach that God is both immanent and transcendent,

personal and impersonal. He may be sought as the Absolute; as one of His

manifest eternal qualities, such as love, wisdom, bliss, light; in the form of

an ishta (deity); or in a concept such as Heavenly Father, Mother, Friend.

egoism. The ego-principle, ahamkara (lit., “I do”), is the root cause of

dualism or the seeming separation between man and his Creator. Ahamkara

brings human beings under the sway of maya (q.v.), by which the subject

(ego) falsely appears as object; the creatures imagine themselves to be

creators. By banishing ego consciousness, man awakens to his divine

identity, his oneness with the Sole Life: God.

elements (five). The Cosmic Vibration, or Aum, structures all physical

creation, including man’s physical body, through the manifestation of five

tattvas (elements): earth, water, fire, air, and ether (q.v.). These are

structural forces, intelligent and vibratory in nature. Without the earth

element there would be no state of solid matter; without the water element,

no liquid state; without the air element, no gaseous state; without the fire

element, no heat; without the ether element, no background on which to

produce the cosmic motion picture show. In the body, prana (cosmic

vibratory energy) enters the medulla and is then divided into the five

elemental currents by the action of the five lower chakras (q.v.), or centers:

the coccygeal (earth), sacral (water), lumbar (fire), dorsal (air), and cervical

(ether). The Sanskrit terminology for these elements is prithivi, ap, tej,

prana, and akasha.

Energization Exercises. Man is surrounded by cosmic energy, much as a

fish is surrounded by water. The Energization Exercises, originated by

Paramahansa Yogananda and taught in the Self-Realization Fellowship

Lessons (q.v.), enable man to recharge his body with this cosmic energy, or

universal prana.

ether. Sanskrit akasha. Though not considered a factor in present scientific

theory on the nature of the material universe, ether has for millenniums

been so referred to by India’s sages. Paramahansa Yogananda spoke of ether

as the background on which God projects the cosmic motion picture of

creation. Space gives dimension to objects; ether separates the images. This

“background,” a creative force that coordinates all spatial vibrations, is a

necessary factor when considering the subtler forces—thought and life

energy (prana)—and the nature of space and the origin of material forces

and matter. See elements.

evil. The satanic force that obscures God’s omnipresence in creation,

manifesting as inharmonies in man and nature. Also, a broad term defining

anything contrary to divine law (see dharma) that causes man to lose the

consciousness of his essential unity with God, and that obstructs attainment

of God-realization.

gunas. The three attributes of Nature: tamas, rajas, and sattva—obstruction,

activity, and expansion; or, mass, energy, and intelligence. In man the three

gunas express themselves as ignorance or inertia; activity or struggle; and

wisdom.

guru. Spiritual teacher. Though the word guru is often misused to refer

simply to any teacher or instructor, a true God-illumined guru is one who,

in his attainment of self-mastery, has realized his identity with the

omnipresent Spirit. Such a one is uniquely qualified to lead the seeker on

his or her inward journey toward divine realization.

When a devotee is ready to seek God in earnest, the Lord sends him a guru.

Through the wisdom, intelligence, Self-realization, and teachings of such a

master, God guides the disciple. By following the master’s teachings and

discipline, the disciple is able to fulfill his soul’s desire for the manna of

God-perception. A true guru, ordained by God to help sincere seekers in

response to their deep soul craving, is not an ordinary teacher: he is a

human vehicle whose body, speech, mind, and spirituality God uses as a

channel to attract and guide lost souls back to their home of immortality. A

guru is a living embodiment of scriptural truth. He is an agent of salvation

appointed by God in response to a devotee’s demand for release from the

bondage of matter. “To keep company with the Guru,” wrote Swami Sri

Yukteswar in The Holy Science, “is not only to be in his physical presence

(as this is sometimes impossible), but mainly means to keep him in our

hearts and to be one with him in principle and to attune ourselves with

him.” See master.

Gurudeva. “Divine teacher,” a customary Sanskrit term of respect that is

used in addressing and referring to one’s spiritual preceptor; sometimes

rendered in English as “Master.”

Gurus of Self-Realization Fellowship. The Gurus of Self-Realization

Fellowship (Yogoda Satsanga Society of India) are Jesus Christ, Bhagavan

Krishna, and a line of exalted masters of contemporary times: Mahavatar

Babaji, Lahiri Mahasaya, Swami Sri Yukteswar, and Paramahansa

Yogananda. To show the harmony and essential unity of the teachings of

Jesus Christ and the Yoga precepts of Bhagavan Krishna is an integral part

of the SRF dispensation. All of these Gurus, by their sublime teachings and

divine instrumentality, contribute to the fulfillment of the Self-Realization

Fellowship mission of bringing to all mankind a practical spiritual science

of God-realization.

Hatha Yoga. A system of techniques and physical postures (asanas) that

promotes health and mental calm. See Yoga.

Holy Ghost. See Aum and Trinity.

intuition. The all-knowing faculty of the soul, which enables man to

experience direct perception of truth without the intermediary of the senses.

Jadava Krishna. Jadava refers to the clan of which Bhagavan Krishna was

king, and is one of many names by which Krishna is known. See Bhagavan

Krishna.

ji. A suffix denoting respect, added to names and titles in India; as,

Gandhiji, Paramahansaji, Guruji.

Jnana Yoga. The path to union with God through transmutation of the

discriminative power of the intellect into the omniscient wisdom of the

soul.

karma. Effects of past actions, from this or previous lifetimes; from the

Sanskrit kri, to do. The equilibrating law of karma, as expounded in the

Hindu scriptures, is that of action and reaction, cause and effect, sowing and

reaping. In the course of natural righteousness, every human being by his

thoughts and actions becomes the molder of his own destiny. Whatever

energies he himself, wisely or unwisely, has set in motion must return to

him as their starting point, like a circle inexorably completing itself. An

understanding of karma as the law of justice serves to free the human mind

from resentment against God and man. A person’s karma follows him from

incarnation to incarnation until fulfilled or spiritually transcended. See

reincarnation.

The cumulative actions of human beings within communities, nations, or

the world as a whole constitute mass karma, which produces local or far-

ranging effects according to the degree and preponderance of good or evil.

The thoughts and actions of every human being, therefore, contribute to the

good or ill of this world and all peoples in it.

Karma Yoga. The path to God through nonattached action and service. By

selfless service, by giving the fruits of one’s actions to God, and by seeing

God as the sole Doer, the devotee becomes free of the ego and experiences

God. See Yoga.

Krishna. See Bhagavan Krishna.

Krishna Consciousness. Christ Consciousness; Kutastha Chaitanya. See

Christ Consciousness.

Kriya Yoga. A sacred spiritual science, originating millenniums ago in

India. It includes certain techniques of meditation whose devoted practice

leads to realization of God. Paramahansa Yogananda has explained that the

Sanskrit root of kriya is kri, to do, to act and react; the same root is found in

the word karma, the natural principle of cause and effect. Kriya Yoga is thus

“union (yoga) with the Infinite through a certain action or rite (kriya).”

Kriya Yoga, a form of Raja (“royal” or “complete”) Yoga, is extolled by

Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita and by Patanjali in the Yoga Sutras. Revived

in this age by Mahavatar Babaji (q.v.), Kriya Yoga is the diksha (spiritual

initiation) bestowed by the Gurus of Self-Realization Fellowship. Since the

mahasamadhi (q.v.) of Paramahansa Yogananda, diksha is conferred

through his appointed spiritual representative, the president of Self-

Realization Fellowship/Yogoda Satsanga Society of India (or through one

appointed by the president). To qualify for diksha Self-Realization members

must fulfill certain preliminary spiritual requirements. One who has

received this diksha is a Kriya Yogi or Kriyaban. See also guru and disciple.

Lahiri Mahasaya. Lahiri was the family name of Shyama Charan Lahiri

(1828–1895). Mahasaya, a Sanskrit religious title, means “large-minded.”

Lahiri Mahasaya was a disciple of Mahavatar Babaji, and the guru of

Swami Sri Yukteswar (Paramahansa Yogananda’s guru). A Christlike

teacher with miraculous powers, he was also a family man with business

responsibilities. His mission was to make known a yoga suitable for modern

man, in which meditation is balanced by right performance of worldly

duties. He has been called a Yogavatar, “Incarnation of Yoga.” Lahiri

Mahasaya was the disciple to whom Babaji revealed the ancient, almost lost

science of Kriya Yoga (q.v.), instructing him in turn to initiate sincere

seekers. Lahiri Mahasaya’s life is described in Autobiography of a Yogi.

Laya Yoga. This yogic system teaches the absorption of mind in the

perception of certain astral sounds, leading to union with God as the cosmic

sound of Aum. See Aum and Yoga.

Lessons. See Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons.

life force. See prana.

lifetrons. See prana.

mahasamadhi. Sanskrit maha, “great,” samadhi. The last meditation, or

conscious communion with God, during which a perfected master merges

himself in the cosmic Aum and casts off the physical body. A master

invariably knows beforehand the time God has appointed for him to leave

his bodily residence. See samadhi.

Mahavatar Babaji. The deathless mahavatar (“great avatar”) who in 1861

gave Kriya Yoga (q.v.) initiation to Lahiri Mahasaya, and thereby restored

to the world the ancient technique of salvation. Perennially youthful, he has

lived for centuries in the Himalayas, bestowing a constant blessing on the

world. His mission has been to assist prophets in carrying out their special

dispensations. Many titles signifying his exalted spiritual stature have been

given to him, but the mahavatar has generally adopted the simple name of

Babaji, from the Sanskrit baba, “father,” and the suffix ji, denoting respect.

More information about his life and spiritual mission is given in

Autobiography of a Yogi. See avatar.

Mantra Yoga. Divine communion attained through devotional, concentrated

repetition of root-word sounds that have a spiritually beneficial vibratory

potency. See Yoga.

master. One who has achieved self-mastery. Paramahansa Yogananda has

pointed out that “the distinguishing qualifications of a master are not

physical but spiritual....Proof that one is a master is supplied only by the

ability to enter at will the breathless state (sabikalpa samadhi) and by the

attainment of immutable bliss (nirbikalpa samadhi).” See samadhi.

Paramahansaji further states: “All scriptures proclaim that the Lord created

man in His omnipotent image. Control over the universe appears to be

supernatural, but in truth such power is inherent and natural in everyone

who attains ‘right remembrance’ of his divine origin. Men of God-

realization...are devoid of the ego-principle (ahamkara) and its uprisings of

personal desires; the actions of true masters are in effortless conformity

with rita, natural righteousness. In Emerson’s words, all great ones become

‘not virtuous, but Virtue; then is the end of the creation answered, and God

is well pleased.’”

maya. The delusory power inherent in the structure of creation, by which

the One appears as many. Maya is the principle of relativity, inversion,

contrast, duality, oppositional states; the “Satan” (lit., in Hebrew, “the

adversary”) of the Old Testament prophets; and the “devil” whom Christ

described picturesquely as a “murderer” and a “liar,” because “there is no

truth in him” (John 8:44).

Paramahansa Yogananda wrote:

“The Sanskrit word maya means ‘the measurer’; it is the magical power in

creation by which limitations and divisions are apparently present in the

Immeasurable and Inseparable. Maya is Nature herself—the phenomenal

worlds, ever in transitional flux as antithesis to Divine Immutability.

“In God’s plan and play (lila), the sole function of Satan or maya is to

attempt to divert man from Spirit to matter, from Reality to unreality. ‘The

devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was

manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil’ (I John 3:8). That

is, the manifestation of Christ Consciousness, within man’s own being,

effortlessly destroys the illusions or ‘works of the devil.’

“Maya is the veil of transitoriness in Nature, the ceaseless becoming of

creation; the veil that each man must lift in order to see behind it the

Creator, the changeless Immutable, eternal Reality.”

meditation. Concentration upon God. The term is used in a general sense to

denote practice of any technique for interiorizing the attention and focusing

it on some aspect of God. In the specific sense, meditation refers to the end

result of successful practice of such techniques: direct experience of God

through intuitive perception. It is the seventh step (dhyana) of the eightfold

path of Yoga described by Patanjali (q.v.), achieved only after one has

attained that fixed concentration within whereby he is completely

undisturbed by sensory impressions from the outer world. In deepest

meditation one experiences the eighth step of the Yoga path: samadhi (q.v.),

communion, oneness with God. (See also Yoga.)

medulla. The principal point of entry of life force (prana) into the body; seat

of the sixth cerebrospinal center, whose function is to receive and direct the

incoming flow of cosmic energy. The life force is stored in the seventh

center (sahasrara) in the topmost part of the brain. From that reservoir it is

distributed throughout the body. The subtle center at the medulla is the main

switch that controls the entrance, storage, and distribution of the life force.

Mt. Washington. Site of, and, by extension, a frequently used name for the

Mother Center and international headquarters of Self-Realization

Fellowship in Los Angeles. The 121/2-acre estate was acquired in 1925 by

Paramahansa Yogananda. He made it a training center for the Self-

Realization Fellowship Monastic Order, and the administrative center for

disseminating worldwide the ancient science of Kriya Yoga.

paramahansa. A spiritual title signifying a master (q.v.). It may be conferred

only by a true guru on a qualified disciple. Paramahansa literally means

“supreme swan.” In the Hindu scriptures, the hansa or swan symbolizes

spiritual discrimination. Swami Sri Yukteswar bestowed the title on his

beloved disciple Yogananda in 1935.

paramguru. Literally, “the preceding guru”; the guru of one’s guru. To Self-

Realizationists (disciples of Paramahansa Yogananda), paramguru refers to

Sri Yukteswar. To Paramahansaji, it meant Lahiri Mahasaya. Mahavatar

Babaji is Paramahansaji’s param-paramguru.

Patanjali. Ancient exponent of Yoga, whose Yoga Sutras outline the

principles of the yogic path, dividing it into eight steps: (1) yama, moral

conduct; (2) niyama, religious observances; (3) asana, right posture to still

bodily restlessness; (4) pranayama, control of prana, subtle life currents; (5)

pratyahara, interiorization; (6) dharana, concentration; (7) dhyana,

meditation; and (8) samadhi, superconscious experience. See Yoga.

prana. Sparks of intelligent finer-than-atomic energy that constitute life,

collectively referred to in Hindu scriptural treatises as prana, which

Paramahansa Yogananda has translated as “lifetrons.” In essence,

condensed thoughts of God; substance of the astral world (q.v.) and life

principle of the physical cosmos. In the physical world, there are two kinds

of prana: (1) the cosmic vibratory energy that is omnipresent in the

universe, structuring and sustaining all things; (2) the specific prana or

energy that pervades and sustains each human body through five currents or

functions. Prana current performs the function of crystallization; Vyana

current, circulation; Samana current, assimilation; Udana current,

metabolism; and Apana current, elimination.

pranam. A form of greeting in India. The hands are pressed, palms together,

with the base of the hands at the heart and the fingertips touching the

forehead. This gesture is actually a modification of the pranam, literally

“complete salutation,” from the Sanskrit root nam, “to salute or bow down,”

and the prefix pra, “completely.” A pranam salutation is the general mode

of greeting in India. Before renunciants and other persons held in high

spiritual regard, it may be accompanied by the spoken word, “Pranam.”

pranayama. Conscious control of prana (the creative vibration or energy

that activates and sustains life in the body). The yoga science of pranayama

is the direct way to consciously disconnect the mind from the life functions

and sensory perceptions that tie man to body consciousness. Pranayama

thus frees man’s consciousness to commune with God. All scientific

techniques that bring about union of soul and Spirit may be classified as

yoga, and pranayama is the greatest yogic method for attaining this divine

union.

Raja Yoga. The “royal” or highest path to God-union. It teaches scientific

meditation (q.v.) as the ultimate means for realizing God, and includes the

highest essentials from all other forms of Yoga. The Self-Realization

Fellowship Raja Yoga teachings outline a way of life leading to perfect

unfoldment in body, mind, and soul, based on the foundation of Kriya Yoga

(q.v.) meditation. See Yoga.

Ranchi school. Yogoda Satsanga Vidyalaya, founded by Paramahansa

Yogananda in 1918 when the Maharaja of Kasimbazar gave his summer

palace and twenty-five acres of land in Ranchi, Bihar, for use as a boys’

school. The property was permanently acquired while Paramahansaji was in

India in 1935 – 36. More than two thousand children now attend Yogoda

schools at Ranchi, from nursery school through college. See Yogoda

Satsanga Society of India.

reincarnation. The doctrine that human beings, compelled by the law of

evolution, incarnate repeatedly in progressively higher lives—retarded by

wrong actions and desires, and advanced by spiritual endeavors—until Self-

realization and God-union are attained. Having thus transcended the

limitations and imperfections of mortal consciousness, the soul is forever

freed from compulsory reincarnation. “Him that overcometh will I make a

pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go no more out” (Revelation

3:12).

The concept of reincarnation is not exclusive to Eastern philosophy, but was

held as a fundamental truth of life by many ancient civilizations. The early

Christian Church accepted the principle of reincarnation, which was

expounded by the Gnostics and by numerous church fathers, including

Clement of Alexandria, Origen, and St. Jerome. It was not until the Second

Council of Constantinople in a.d. 553 that the doctrine was officially

removed from church teachings. Today many Western thinkers are

beginning to adopt the concept of the law of karma (q.v.) and reincarnation,

seeing in it a grand and reassuring explanation of life’s seeming inequities.

rishis. Seers, exalted beings who manifest divine wisdom; especially, the

illumined sages of ancient India to whom the Vedas were intuitively

revealed.

sadhana. Path of spiritual discipline. The specific instruction and meditation

practices prescribed by the guru for his disciples, who by faithfully

following them ultimately realize God.

samadhi. The highest step on the Eightfold Path of Yoga, as outlined by the

sage Patanjali (q.v.). Samadhi is attained when the meditator, the process of

meditation (by which the mind is withdrawn from the senses by

interiorization), and the object of meditation (God) become One.

Paramahansa Yogananda has explained that “in the initial states of God-

communion (sabikalpa samadhi) the devotee’s consciousness merges in the

Cosmic Spirit; his life force is withdrawn from the body, which appears

‘dead,’ or motionless and rigid. The yogi is fully aware of his bodily

condition of suspended animation. As he progresses to higher spiritual

states (nirbikalpa samadhi), however, he communes with God without

bodily fixation; and in his ordinary waking consciousness, even in the midst

of exacting worldly duties.” Both states are characterized by oneness with

the ever new bliss of Spirit, but the nirbikalpa state is experienced by only

the most highly advanced masters.

Sanatana Dharma. Literally, “eternal religion.” The name given to the body

of Vedic teachings that came to be called Hinduism after the Greeks

designated the people on the banks of the river Indus as Indoos, or Hindus.

See dharma.

Satan. Literally, in Hebrew, “the adversary.” Satan is the conscious and

independent universal force that keeps everything and everybody deluded

with the unspiritual consciousness of finiteness and separateness from God.

To accomplish this, Satan uses the weapons of maya (cosmic delusion) and

avidya (individual delusion, ignorance). See maya.

Sat-Tat-Aum. Sat, Truth, the Absolute, Bliss; Tat, universal intelligence or

consciousness; Aum, cosmic intelligent creative vibration, word-symbol for

God. See Aum and Trinity.

Self. Capitalized to denote the atman or soul, the divine essence of man, as

distinguished from the ordinary self, which is the human personality or ego.

The Self is individualized Spirit, whose essential nature is ever-existing,

ever-conscious, ever-new Bliss. The Self or soul is man’s inner

fountainhead of love, wisdom, peace, courage, compassion, and all other

divine qualities.

Self-Realization. An abbreviated way of referring to Self-Realization

Fellowship, the society founded by Paramahansa Yogananda, often used by

him in informal talks; e.g., “the Self-Realization teachings”; “the path of

Self-Realization”; “Self-Realization headquarters in Los Angeles”; etc.

Self-realization. Paramahansa Yogananda has defined Self-realization as

follows: “Self-realization is the knowing—in body, mind, and soul—that

we are one with the omnipresence of God; that we do not have to pray that

it come to us, that we are not merely near it at all times, but that God’s

omnipresence is our omnipresence; that we are just as much a part of Him

now as we ever will be. All we have to do is improve our knowing.”

Self-Realization Fellowship. The society founded by Paramahansa

Yogananda in the United States in 1920 (and as Yogoda Satsanga Society of

India in 1917) for disseminating worldwide, for the aid and benefit of

humanity, the spiritual principles and meditation techniques of Kriya Yoga

(q.v.). The international headquarters, the Mother Center, is in Los Angeles,

California. Paramahansa Yogananda has explained that the name Self-

Realization Fellowship signifies “fellowship with God through Self-

realization, and friendship with all truth-seeking souls.” See also “Aims and

Ideals of Self-Realization Fellowship,” page 426.

Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons. The teachings of Paramahansa

Yogananda, compiled into a comprehensive series of lessons for home study

and made available to sincere truth-seekers all over the world. These

lessons contain the yoga meditation techniques taught by Paramahansa

Yogananda, including, for those who fulfill certain requirements, Kriya

Yoga (q.v.). Information about the Lessons is available on request from

Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters.

Self-Realization magazine. A quarterly journal published by Self-

Realization Fellowship, featuring the talks and writings of Paramahansa

Yogananda; and containing other spiritual, practical, and informative

articles of current interest and lasting value.

Shankara, Swami. Sometimes referred to as Adi (“the first”)

Shankaracharya (Shankara + acharya, “teacher”); India’s most illustrious

philosopher. His date is uncertain; many scholars assign him to the eighth or

early ninth century. He expounded God not as a negative abstraction, but as

positive, eternal, omnipresent, ever new Bliss. Shankara reorganized the

ancient Swami Order, and founded four great maths (monastic centers of

spiritual education), whose leaders in apostolic succession bear the title of

Jagadguru Sri Shankaracharya. The meaning of Jagadguru is “world

teacher.”

siddha. Literally, “one who is successful.” One who has attained Self-

realization.

soul. Individualized Spirit. The soul is the true and immortal nature of man,

and of all living forms of life; it is cloaked only temporarily in the garments

of causal, astral, and physical bodies. The nature of the soul is Spirit: ever-

existing, ever-conscious, ever-new Joy.

spiritual eye. The single eye of intuition and omnipresent perception at the

Christ (Kutastha) center (ajna chakra) between the eyebrows. The deeply

meditating devotee beholds the spiritual eye as a ring of golden light

encircling a sphere of opalescent blue, and at the center, a pentagonal white

star. Microcosmically, these forms and colors epitomize, respectively, the

vibratory realm of creation (Cosmic Nature, Holy Ghost); the Son or

intelligence of God in creation (Christ Consciousness); and the vibrationless

Spirit beyond all creation (God the Father).

The spiritual eye is the entryway into the ultimate states of divine

consciousness. In deep meditation, as the devotee’s consciousness

penetrates the spiritual eye, into the three realms epitomized therein, he

experiences successively the following states: superconsciousness or the

ever new joy of soul-realization, and oneness with God as Aum (q.v.) or

Holy Ghost; Christ consciousness, oneness with the universal intelligence

of God in all creation; and cosmic consciousness, unity with the

omnipresence of God that is beyond as well as within vibratory

manifestation. See also consciousness, states of; superconsciousness; Christ

Consciousness.

Explaining a passage from Ezekiel (43:1–2), Paramahansa Yogananda has

written: “Through the divine eye in the forehead, (‘the east’), the yogi sails

his consciousness into omnipresence, hearing the word or Aum, the divine

sound of ‘many waters’: the vibrations of light that constitute the sole

reality of creation.” In Ezekiel’s words: “Afterwards he brought me to the

gate, even the gate that looketh towards the east; and behold, the glory of

the God of Israel came from the way of the east; and His voice was like the

noise of many waters; and the earth shined with His glory.”

Jesus also spoke of the spiritual eye: “When thine eye is single, thy whole

body also is full of light....Take heed therefore that the light which is in thee

be not darkness” (Luke 11:34–35).

Sri. A title of respect. When used before the name of a religious person, it

means “holy” or “revered.”

Sri Yukteswar, Swami. Swami Sri Yukteswar Giri (1855–1936), India’s

Jnanavatar, “Incarnation of Wisdom”; guru of Paramahansa Yogananda, and

paramguru of Self-Realization Fellowship Kriyaban members. Sri

Yukteswarji was a disciple of Lahiri Mahasaya. At the behest of Lahiri

Mahasaya’s guru, Mahavatar Babaji, he wrote The Holy Science, a treatise

on the underlying unity of Christian and Hindu scriptures, and trained

Paramahansa Yogananda for his spiritual world-mission: the dissemination

of Kriya Yoga (q.v.). Paramahansaji has lovingly described Sri

Yukteswarji’s life in Autobiography of a Yogi.

superconscious mind. The all-knowing power of the soul that perceives

truth directly; intuition.

superconsciousness. The pure, intuitive, all-seeing, ever-blissful

consciousness of the soul. Sometimes used generally to refer to all the

various states of samadhi (q.v.) experienced in meditation, but specifically

the first state of samadhi, wherein one transcends ego consciousness and

realizes his self as soul, made in the image of God. Thence follow the

higher states of realization: Christ consciousness and cosmic consciousness

(q.v.).

swami. A member of India’s most ancient monastic order, reorganized in

the eighth or early ninth century by Swami Shankara (q.v.). A swami takes

formal vows of celibacy and renunciation of worldly ties and ambitions; he

devotes himself to meditation and other spiritual practices, and to service to

humanity. There are ten classificatory titles of the venerable Swami Order,

as Giri, Puri, Bharati, Tirtha, Saraswati, and others. Swami Sri Yukteswar

(q.v.) and Paramahansa Yogananda belonged to the Giri (“mountain”)

branch.

The Sanskrit word swami means “he who is one with the Self (Swa).”

Trinity. When Spirit manifests creation, It becomes the Trinity: Father, Son,

Holy Ghost, or Sat, Tat, Aum. The Father (Sat) is God as the Creator

existing beyond creation. The Son (Tat) is God’s omnipresent intelligence

existing in creation. The Holy Ghost (Aum) is the vibratory power of God

that objectifies or becomes creation.

Many cycles of cosmic creation and dissolution have come and gone in

Eternity (see yuga). At the time of cosmic dissolution, the Trinity and all

other relativities of creation resolve into the Absolute Spirit.

Vedanta. Literally, “end of the Vedas”; the philosophy stemming from the

Upanishads, or latter portion of the Vedas. Shankara (eighth or early ninth

century) was the chief exponent of Vedanta, which declares that God is the

only reality and that creation is essentially an illusion. As man is the only

creature capable of conceiving of God, man himself must be divine, and his

duty therefore is to realize his true nature.

Vedas. The four scriptural texts of the Hindus: Rig Veda, Sama Veda, Yajur

Veda, and Atharva Veda. They are essentially a literature of chant, ritual,

and recitation for vitalizing and spiritualizing all phases of man’s life and

activity. Among the immense texts of India, the Vedas (Sanskrit root vid,

“to know”) are the only writings to which no author is ascribed. The Rig

Veda assigns a celestial origin to the hymns and tells us they have come

down from “ancient times,” reclothed in new language. Divinely revealed

from age to age to the rishis, “seers,” the four Vedas are said to possess

nityatva, “timeless finality.”

Yoga. From Sanskrit yuj, “union.” Yoga means union of the individual soul

with Spirit; also, the methods by which this goal is attained. Within the

larger spectrum of Hindu philosophy, Yoga is one of six orthodox systems:

Vedanta, Mimamsa, Sankhya, Vaisesika, Nyaya, and Yoga. There are also

various types of yoga methods: Hatha Yoga, Mantra Yoga, Laya Yoga,

Karma Yoga, Jnana Yoga, Bhakti Yoga, and Raja Yoga. Raja Yoga, the

“royal” or complete yoga, is that which is taught by Self-Realization

Fellowship, and which Bhagavan Krishna extols to his disciple Arjuna in

the Bhagavad Gita: “The yogi is deemed greater than body-disciplining

ascetics, greater even than the followers of the path of wisdom or of the

path of action; be thou, O Arjuna, a yogi!” (Bhagavad Gita VI:46). The

sage Patanjali, foremost exponent of Yoga, has outlined eight definite steps

by which the Raja Yogi attains samadhi, or union with God. These are (1)

yama, moral conduct; (2) niyama, religious observances; (3) asana, right

posture to still bodily restlessness; (4) pranayama, control of prana, subtle

life currents; (5) pratyahara, interiorization; (6) dharana, concentration, (7)

dhyana, meditation; and (8) samadhi, superconscious experience.

yogi. One who practices Yoga (q.v.). Anyone who practices a scientific

technique for divine realization is a yogi. He may be either married or

unmarried, either a man of worldly responsibilities or one of formal

religious ties.

Yogoda Satsanga Society of India. The name by which Paramahansa

Yogananda’s society is known in India. The Society was founded by him in

1917. Its headquarters, Yogoda Math, is situated on the banks of the Ganges

at Dakshineswar, near Calcutta, with a branch math at Ranchi, Jharkhand.

In addition to meditation centers and groups throughout India, Yogoda

Satsanga Society has seventeen educational institutions, from primary

through college level. Yogoda, a word coined by Paramahansa Yogananda,

is derived from yoga, “union, harmony, equilibrium”; and da, “that which

imparts.” Satsanga means “divine fellowship,” or “fellowship with Truth.”

For the West, Paramahansaji translated the Indian name as “Self-Realization

Fellowship” (q.v.).

yuga. A cycle or subperiod of creation, outlined in ancient Hindu texts. Sri

Yukteswar (q.v.) describes in The Holy Science a 24,000-year Equinoctial

Cycle and mankind’s present place in it. This cycle occurs within the much

longer universal cycle of the ancient texts, as calculated by the ancient

rishis and noted in Autobiography of a Yogi, chapter 16:

“The universal cycle of the scriptures is 4,300,560,000 years in extent, and

measures out a ‘Day of Creation.’ This vast figure is based on the

relationship between the length of the solar year and a multiple of pi

(3.1416, the ratio of the circumference to the diameter of a circle).

“The life span for a whole universe, according to the ancient seers, is

314,159,000,000,000 solar years, or ‘One Age of Brahma.’”

Back Cover