Be Aware of the Self Always

Sri Annamalai Swami

You stumble around in the darkness of your mind, not knowing that you have a torch in your hand. That light is the light of the Self. Switch it on and leave it on and you will never stumble again.

You are all here because there is a desire in you to realize the Self. This desire does not arise randomly or accidentally in some people and not in others. It is there because of the punyas you have accumulated from previous births, punyas that may have come from meditation, charitable works, and so on. These punyas will manifest as a desire for freedom, a desire to do earnest sadhana a desire to find a good teacher in whose presence the truth will be taught an revealed. If someone is destined to be a jnani in this life it means that he has come to this final birth with a mountain of punyas to his credit.  These punyas will take him to a real guru, to a real satsang, and in this environment he will do sadhana and achieve the goal.

If one does not have this mountain of punyas from the past, there will be no desire for freedom, no desire to look for a guru who can deliver it. Such a person may meet a guru and that guru may even give him good advice, but the determined resolve to put that advice into effect will not be there. The fierce determination to succeed and the discrimination that allows one to ignore worldly entanglements only arise in those who have accumulated these punyas. Other people may hear the words of truth, but although they accept that they are true, the inclination to act on these will not be there.

Wet wood does not catch fire easily, but if you dry it for a long time in the sun it will be much more combustible. Other materials such as camphor, petrol, kerosene and gunpowder will ignite as soon as they are touched by a flame. Devotees can be classified the same way: some ignite as soon as they meet a guru or hear the truth for the first time; others need a period of drying out before they are ready to catch fire.

Those who are damp or wet can dry themselves out by sadhana by having a strong determination to be aware of the Self at all times. Self is readily available all the time but we cannot be aware of it or even put our attention on the thought of it because our vasanas are continuously leading our interest and attention in other directions. That is why it is so important to have the awareness, "I am not the mind. I am the Self." You have forcibly to drag your wandering attention back to the Self each time it shows an interest in going anywhere else. Don't be interested in the words that the mind is serving up for you. It is putting them there to tempt you into a stream of thoughts that will take you away from the Self. You have to ignore them all and focus on the light that is shining within you.