Real form of Upasana 1

It should be clearly understood that a really worthwhile thing is bound to cost more. If a person wants to be included in the central Cabinet, he has to get himself elected as a member of the Parliament. He has to get himself elected as a member of the parliament. The meaning of upasana is to sit closeby. It is not like the railway passengers who jostle or push each other to get into the train somehow. It is like two boson friends who have two bodies with one mind and one soul sitting together. In such intimacy one has to surrender to the other. A devotee (bhakta) has to mould his life and surrender himself to the will of God.

Explaining the importance and philosophy of upasana, which is the first essential pre-requisite for spiritual upliftment, Gurudev said, "God cannot dance to yours tune. You will have to become his devotee and act according to His will. If you will are able to do so, you will become identical with God. Fuel has no worth except when it embrances fire and becomes fire itself. Fire does not become fuel. It is gruel which has to be transformed into fire. A drain meets a river and becomes as purifying and great as the river itself. But it never happens that a river flows in inverse, meets the drain and becomes dirty like it. Iron comes in contact with paras, (the mystical stone which is said to convert iron into gold by mere touch), and turns into gold. It does not become paras. It is the sadhak who has to dance to the tune of God like a puppet. God does not fulfill the wishes of the sadhak. A sadhak has to surrender himself to God and fulfill His will. A drop of water merges into and becomes one with the ocean. The ocean does not become a drop. This is the philosophy of Upasana. If a person wants to do Upasana he has to sit near God, do His will and become His follower."

I had to do the same. I worshipped God, performed Jap of Gayatri as Divine Mother and meditated upon Savita as Divine Father. Throughout, I had only one feeling. Like Shravankumar, I would demand nothing from my parents but carry them on pilgrimage. I would mould my character in such a way that I may be called a worthy son of worthy Parents.

I did, no doubt, regard Gayatri as Mother and Savita as Father for the sake of convenience of meditation but knew throughout that they are formless, astral and all-pervading. On account of this conviction I could feel that they pervaded my whole being and there was complete identity of Spirit. If I had regarded God or Gayatri Mata as specific persons a distance between us would have been maintained and I had been deprived of that feeling of complete identification.