Letter 101

(101) DELUSION AND PEACE OF MIND
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28th March, 1947
Yesterday a youth arrived from Andhra Pradesh. From his looks he appeared to be simple-minded. He approached Bhagavan this morning and asked, “Swamiji! I came here ten months ago for your darshan. I got a desire to have your darshan again now, and so immediately set out and came here. I could not delay even for a moment. Can I do so in future also, whenever I have such a desire?” Bhagavan replied, “Whatever happens, happens. Everything happens according to what we deserve. Why worry in advance about it?”

He again asked, “Can I come whenever I have such a desire at any time in the future? Or, should I suppress the desire?” “Things happen of their own accord, if you stop thinking ahead to the future,” replied Bhagavan.

Question: “I am not able to suppress this desire even for a moment. Is it a self-deception?” Bhagavan looked at me with a smile, and said, “It seems he came here some time ago, and again had a desire to come here now, and so he came immediately. He is asking me whether he may do so whenever he has such a desire in future.” The youth intervened and said, “Whenever I get the desire to see Bhagavan, I am not able to control it even for a moment. I am only asking whether it is mere mental delusion.” I said, “How can a desire to have darshan of a great person be mere mental delusion? While there are so many delusions of the mind to be controlled and suppressed, does this desire alone appear to you to be a mental delusion?” There was no further question.

There were some Andhra visitors in the hall who had come there on pilgrimage. One of them got up and asked, “Swamiji! How does the soul attain peace?” Bhagavan replied, laughing, “What! What is peace for the soul?” “No, no! I mean for the mind.”

“Oh! for the mind! The mind attains peace if the vasanas are suppressed. For that, one must enquire and realise who one is. How can one get peace by merely saying, ‘I want peace, I want peace!’ without first enquiring what is peace? First make efforts to recognise and realise what already exists.”

There was a Pandit among them. He asked, “Life itself becomes extremely hard in some places. How is one to perform sadhana in such places?”

Bhagavan replied, “The place is within you; you are not in the place. When you are in all places, where is the question of difficulties in some places, and not in others? All are within yourself. How can they cause you difficulties?”
“But we get no peace of mind at all in some places,” he protested and Bhagavan replied, “That which always exists is peace. That is your natural state. You are not able to recognise your natural state. You get deluded by aberrations which are unreal and feel sorry that there is no peace. If you realise your self, all places will become equally suitable for sadhana.”