Sathya Sai Baba. Supernatural Experiences and Divine Transformation. Book Two

Dubyanskiy Svyatoslav

All outer worship ultimately leads to the mystical experience of the Absolute Self. The true "Self" is beyond space and time. Each person is born into this world with a unique spiritual task. Everyone is the creator of their life and the author of their reality. In the highest sense, the goal of human life is self-knowledge of the eternal divine essence of one's soul and self-realization of one's God-given talents.

Spiritual evolution takes place not only in meditation and prayer, but in all life events. Any experience you have in life is part of your spiritual evolution. Everything you do can become a spiritual practice if it is done in the awareness of oneness.

Your physical body, family, financial situation, success, like everything else, is the result of your own thoughts. If you are not satisfied with the circumstances in which you live your life, you need to start with the transformation of your thoughts. A man is what he thinks.

The Vedas and the Bible say that every person is created in the image and likeness of God himself, which means that every person is initially perfect, brilliant, omnipotent, and a wise creator of his reality. But there is another point of view about the creation of man. If we perceive God as a higher power that is outside of man, then we can say that God created man and endowed him with certain qualities. However, if we understand God as the True "I", then it turns out that "I am God" created himself as "I am man." In Sanskrit, this is called "Sambhava", which means "created" itself.

In this chapter, we have recollected amazing stories about traditional Vedic ceremonies which were performed quite often in Sathya Sai Baba's ashram. Why was it necessary? The deep meaning of Vedic worship is to reveal the inner divinity of each person. All outer worship ultimately leads to the mystical experience of the Absolute Self.

7. Unity of duality

Where there is duality, there is a desire to acquire or a desire to avoid, a desire to possess or a fear of losing. When you gain wisdom, you experience a state of oneness where there is no duality, which means there is nothing to desire and nothing to avoid.

(Sathya Sai Baba – Sathya Sai Gita Chapter 14)

Man lives in duality because the main property of the manifested world is duality. There's nothing wrong with that as it's just a property of the universe. Duality is manifested in male and female, day and night, sun and moon, north and south poles, right and left hemispheres of the brain. The Chinese Taoist tradition talks about the interaction and balance of Yin and Yang. Even in the process of breathing, duality is manifested – inhalation is replaced by exhalation.

The question is not how to run away from duality, but how to perceive duality. A person who sees the original unity in duality is freed from attachments and internal conflicts. Duality is not to be fought or avoided, it must be understood and accepted. There are no contradictions in duality because duality is the harmony of unity in diversity. Perhaps the most striking manifestation of the unity of duality is shown in the interaction of male and female principles in the universe.

A person who is in the Spirit of God naturally finds abundance and happiness. Only one who constantly divides and cannot accept the integrity of the universe tries to give up the so-called material to acquire the so-called spiritual. The Divine is in everything. Where and why do you want to run away? Maybe it's time to see God in everything?

Even if you practice visualization regularly and very well the result will not come, because it is necessary to also perform an action. Even the Avatar always acts.

The Avatar is also in the world of duality. He performs actions being in the awareness of the original unity. Sathya Sai Baba also aspired to implement his projects and successfully achieve his social goals. Spirituality is not about trying naively to avoid active social activity, but about doing action while realizing the unity and interconnectedness of all that exists.

The most subtle action that absolutely everyone performs is breathing. The process of breathing is deeply connected with the flow of thoughts and the circulation of vital energy. Some tried to tell Sathya Sai Baba that they were supposedly completely freed from any activity. His response was, “how can you be inactive if you are breathing? Breath is the original source of any action.”

8. Difficult mysteries of past lives

One day an Indian family came to the ashram: a husband, wife and two children. They were eager to have an audience with Sathya Sai Baba in order to consult with him on several serious issues. They asked an acquaintance, who worked in the administration of the ashram to intercede on their behalf and ask about a personal meeting with their Sai Baba.

In the earlier period of Sathya Sai Baba's life, when there were still not so many people around him, such situations were quite possible. Subsequently, he became so popular that it was impossible to arrange individual personal meetings. Each time, to invite or not to invite a person to a personal conversation was the exclusive choice of Sathya Sai Baba himself. However, in those days one could ask someone to arrange a personal meeting.

So, this Indian family turned to an acquaintance who worked in the administration of the ashram and asked him to help in organizing an audience. When the administrator turned to Sathya Sai Baba with the request, he immediately said that both children in this family were blind. This surprised everyone present, because Sathya Sai Baba was not familiar with this family before and none of those present knew the children were blind.

Several days passed, but Sathya Sai Baba did not extend invitation for this family to have a private conversation. A few days later, Sathya Sai Baba approached his assistants and told them that in her previous life the mother of the blind children had pierced the eyes of her adopted children in anger, and as a result of this, in this life her two children were blind. Hearing this revelation, everyone was surprised how much Sathya Sai Baba knew not only about the present life, but the past lives of people.

In most cases, people perceive situations superficially without understanding the underlying causes of certain events. When problems start, the question arises: if I did nothing wrong, why am I suffering? Most often, people perceive their life as limited within this incarnation. Thoughts and actions committed in the past literally build all the circumstances of life in the present. Everything that happens in this life is shaped by what a person has done in many previous births, but it is quite difficult to remember exactly or consciously to know the actions of your past lives.