Keep your mind and inner senses pristine

It is ironical that we spend a lot of time and effort to keep our surroundings clean, our kitchen clean, even our bathroom clean; however, we give no importance to keep our mind and inner senses pristine. We don’t spend any time or effort to save our mind from getting tarnished by the feelings of jealousy, hate, fear, animosity, worries or burning desires of material possessions. For the sake of material gain and enjoying sensual pleasures, we go up to any extent. We continue to participate in the rat race without realizing that life is not only meant to be a race.

When we indulge ourselves in material sensual pleasures; when our actions are motivated only by selfish cause; when we keep our mind busy all the times by surfing internet, talking on cell phones or watching TV; when we give undue importance only to material gain and material world, we end up staining our inner senses; we loose peace of mind and become discontented, restless, worried and agitated. And how can such a restless mind achieve a state of inner happiness?

Shrimad Rajchandra, whom Mahatma Gandhi used to admire as a saintly being, went to meet college students once. Students insisted the saint to preach them a few words of wisdom. He asked the college students, “Let’s say that you are carrying pure clarified butter(ghee) in one hand and butter milk in the other. While walking with busy hands, if you happen to stumble and you have to let go of the one, which one would you let go?” The college students unanimously answered, “The butter milk”. “Why is that?” One of the students answered, “Because clarified butter is more valuable than the butter milk.” The saint concluded by saying, “Similarly, my dear boys, you should be willing to let go of the material gains, your sensual desires and cravings of this world in order to protect the sanity of your mind. Even at the cost of incurring material loss, always try to save the peace of your mind because peace of mind is more precious than the belongings of this world.”

How do we keep our mind and inner senses (mind, intellect, mood and ego) pristine? By purifying our intellect with the knowledge of the Self; by giving importance to our own discrimination rather than blind faith; By analyzing about the true goal of human life; By inquiring about “Who am I?”, “What is God?”, “What is the relation between soul and supreme soul?”; By listening to the talks of the Self realized ones; By reading holy literature and stories of saints; By giving due importance to the wisdom of the Self in order to gain the understanding of inner faculties; By being spiritual and by giving importance to the inner world.

A true seeker of inner happiness always give priority to keeping the inner world pristine so that the supreme form of divine peace and divine happiness can reside within. Such a seeker put in all the efforts to keep the temple of his heart pure and pristine, to feel the divine presence within.