Keeping the Atmosphere

It takes about a year to plan Master’s official tour to a centre. During that time, if we want to attend his visit we have to make all kinds of personal arrangements. We have to decide whether we will fly or drive, arrange for our hotel, food, and request vacation time if we work. Just as important – we focus on our spiritual life.

There is anticipation, excitement, love and longing at the thought of being in the presence of the Master. We hope that seeing him will recharge our spiritual batteries and get us back on track and working towards our main goal in this life, that of God-realization.

Now, months after his visit – when our Master has come and gone
– we might ask ourselves, “What has happened to our longing for darshan and for being in his physical presence?”

Master has talked about how we have to keep our objectives before us and work hard to line up our actions with these objectives. We have heard so many satsangs, we have been on the path for so many years and we have seen him so many times. Now, he says, what is needed is the action. It is time to apply what we have been learning.

While it might seem easier to keep our objectives before us and attend to our meditation when we are visiting at Dera or doing seva at one of the centres, the challenge for us is to bring that atmosphere of the peace we felt, that determination that we had, into our everyday life.

How can we recreate that atmosphere? How can we attend to meditation and keep him in our thoughts in the middle of the chaos of everyday life? How can we keep the focus on him?

Maharaj Charan Singh has said that twenty-four hours in a day are enough to attend to our jobs, our families, our sleep, our other duties and to give at least two and a half hours to our meditation.

We have to make the time, we have to make meditation our number one priority, and then the rest will fall into place. The atmosphere that we seek will be with us. The Master often tells us: Words will just give us words but actions will give us actions.

This, then, is our next step: Doing our simran and bhajan in order to keep the atmosphere of him alive every day of our lives.

Without the company of a Saint,
there can be no discourse on God;
Without such a discourse one’s delusion
cannot be dispelled;
And until delusion is dispelled,
One can never have unwavering love for God.
_{The Teachings of Goswami Tulsidas}