Message for the Day….” Expansion is the keynote of Education…”

Expansion is the keynote of education. The first step for this expansion is the home, where you must revere and please your parents who gave you this chance to live and learn. If you ill-treat them or inflict grief on their minds, how can you ever gladden others by service and understanding? You know that when a balloon is blown, it bursts and the air inside it merges with the vast limitless expanse outside. So too your love must fill your home and your society, and finally burst even those bonds and become worldwide. A drop of water held in the palm evaporates soon; it is very solitary. But drop it into the sea – it survives! It assumes the name, the majesty and the might of a sea! Cultivate the seeds of love in all hearts!

Sathya Sai Baba

Message for the Day….” Don’t search for faults in others and hide your own …”

Sathya Sai Baba

It is not the nature of a spiritual aspirant to search for faults in others and hide their own. If your faults are pointed out to you by someone, don’t argue and try to prove that you were right, and don’t bear a grudge against them for it. Reason out within yourself how it is a fault and set right your own behaviour. Rationalising it for your own satisfaction or wreaking vengeance on the person who pointed it out —these should not be the traits of a spiritual aspirant or devotee. The spiritual aspirant must always seek the truthful and joyful, and must avoid all thoughts of the untrue, sad and depressing. Depression, doubt, conceit — these are as detrimental as Rahuand Kethu (evil planetary influences) to the spiritual aspirant. They will harm one’s spiritual practice. When your devotion is well established, these can be easily discarded if they appear. Above all, you must be joyful, smiling, and enthusiastic under all circumstances.

Message for the Day…” All the human beings you see are forms of the Divine…”

Love is Divine. Love all, impart your love even to those who lack love. Love is like a mariner’s compass. Wherever you may keep it, it points the way to God. In every action in daily life manifest your love. Divinity will emerge from that love. This is the easiest path to God-realization. But why aren’t people taking to it? This is because they are obsessed with misconception relating to the means of experiencing God. They regard God as some remote entity attainable only by arduous spiritual practices. God is everywhere. There is no need to search for God. All that you see is a manifestation of the Divine. All the human beings you see are forms of the Divine. Correct your defective vision and you will experience God in all things. Speak lovingly, act lovingly, think with love and do every action with a love-filled heart.

Sathya Sai Baba

Message for the Day…” Think over the Consequences of whatever you do, talk or execute…”

Every person is liable to commit mistakes without being aware of it. However bright the fire or light, some smoke will emanate from it. So also, whatever good deed a person might do, mixed with it will be a minute trace of evil. But efforts should be made to ensure that the evil is minimised, that the good is more and the bad is less. Naturally in the present atmosphere, you may not succeed in the very first attempt. You must carefully think over the consequences of whatever you do, talk, or execute. In whatever way you want others to honour you, or to love you, or to behave with you, in the same way you should first behave with others, and love and honour them. Then only will those honour you. Instead without yourself honouring and loving others, if you complain that they are not treating you properly, it is surely a wrong conclusion.

Sathya Sai Baba

Message for the Day….” What is the true “naivedyam” to God …? “

Young age is like a delicious fruit. You should offer this sweet and delicious fruit to God. It is not possible to begin worshipping God after retirement in old age, when your body becomes weak, the sense organs lose their power, and the mind becomes feeble. Start early, drive slowly and reach safely. Start praying to God right from an early age. If you do not undertake sacred actions when your physical and mental faculties are strong, then when will you perform them? What can you do when the sense organs have lost all their power? Hence practice offering the fragrant flowers of your mind and heart to God with total faith from a young age. This is true naivedyam (food offering). Many people today do not make such offerings. When their senses become weak after indulging in all sorts of sensual pleasures, they think of offering them to God, akin to offering leftover food.

Sathya Sai Baba

Message for the Day….” The human body is a plantain leaf, your heart is a sacred vessel and and the sacred food items are the virtues and acts of good conduct.”

Before offering to God, it is food. Once it is offered to God, it becomes free from all impurities and gets transformed into prasadam. By eating such sacred food, one will not acquire any mental impurities. We offer food to God on a clean plantain leaf. The human body is a plantain leaf, your heart is a sacred vessel and and the sacred food items are the virtues and acts of good conduct. Today to whom are you offering food? Your sacred food offering is to demons of wicked feelings such as anger, hatred, and jealousy. The left over is being offered to God. That is why you are victims of restlessness, difficulties, sorrows, and misery. Get rid of your evil qualities and offer your virtues to God with the prayer: ‘Oh God, You are the resident of my heart and You are the embodiment of love, kindness, and compassion.

Sathya Sai Baba

Message for the Day… ” Exercise Control over Your speech, vision and laughter…”

None can escape from the reaction, reflection, and resound of their actions. Everyone will have to experience the consequences of their own actions. People who indulge in evil practices become distant from God. People who earn a bad reputation through their evil deeds will have no place in divine proximity. Therefore have a check on yourself when you laugh or scorn at others. Not just this, your speech and vision also must be in check. Some people sing inappropriate songs and eve tease women walking on the road. Has God given you a tongue to sing such vulgar songs? How sacred is the tongue, and what an evil use you put it to? By acting in an inappropriate manner, you ruin your reputation and subject yourself to ridicule by others. Therefore exercise control over your speech, vision, and laughter. If you want to earn a good name in the society and be respected by it, conduct yourself in a befitting manner.

Sathya Sai Baba

Message for the Day…” Like cream in milk, and fire in fuel, God is in everything….Have full faith on this…”

There is no penance (tapas) higher than fortitude, no happiness greater than contentment, no good deed (punya) holier than mercy, no weapon more effective than patience. Consider your body as the field and good deeds as seeds and cultivate the name of the Lord, with the help of the heart as farmer, to reap the harvest of the Lord Himself. Like cream in milk and fire in fuel, the Lord is in everything. Have full faith in this. As the milk, so the cream; as the fuel, so the fire; so also, as the spiritual discipline, so is the direct divine experience (sakshatkara)! Even if you don’t attain liberation (mukthi) as a consequence of taking up the Lord’s name, one of these four gates will be open to you: Company of the virtuous, truth, contentment and control of the senses. Anyone who enters through any one of these gates will certainly attain the Lord without fail.

Sathya Sai Baba

Message for the Day….” “Remain equal-minded in happiness and sorrow, gain and loss, victory and defeat “

 

Good and bad, wealth and poverty, praise and blame go together in this world. You cannot derive happiness out of happiness (Na sukhat labhate sukham). Happiness comes only out of sorrow. A wealthy man today may become a pauper tomorrow. Similarly, a pauper may become a rich man some day or other. Today you are being praised, but tomorrow you may be criticised. To consider praise and blame, happiness and sorrow, prosperity and adversity with equal-mindedness is the hallmark of a true human being. The Gita declares, “Remain equal-minded in happiness and sorrow, gain and loss, victory and defeat (Sukha Dukhe same kritva labhalabhau jayajayau). You can truly enjoy your life as a human being only when you consider both sorrow and happiness, profit and loss with equanimity. There is no value for happiness without sorrow. Therefore, welcome sorrow if you want to experience real happiness.

Sathya Sai Baba

Message for the Day……” Whose Heart is the Seat of God …” ?

Quarreling at every tiny little thing, losing one’s temper, becoming sad at the slightest provocation, getting angry at the smallest insult, worried at thirst, hunger, and loss of sleep — these can never be the characteristics of an aspirant. Rice in its natural state and boiled rice — can these two be the same? The hardness of natural rice is absent in the boiled one. The boiled grain is soft, harmless, and sweet. The unboiled raw grain is hard, conceited, and full of delusion. Both types are souls (jivis) and humans no doubt, but those immersed in external illusions (avidya-maya) are ‘people’, while those immersed in internal illusions (vidya-maya) are ‘spiritual aspirants’. God has neither internal illusions nor external illusions; He is devoid of both. The one who has no external illusions, becomes a spiritual aspirant, and when they are devoid of internal illusions too, they can be termed as God. Such a person’s heart is truly the seat of God.

Sathya Sai Baba