There were many cases where Sathya Sai Baba quickly helped people and they were happy. There were also cases that when the healing did not happen instantly, people became disappointed and accused him of fraud, because he did not justify their hopes for an instant solution to their problems. People are accustomed to the fact that Sathya Sai Baba solves all people's problems with the power of his energy within a second. More realistically, it can sometimes take time to solve some people’s difficult situations due to their karma. In these cases, some could be offended by him.
In my life there were many internal conflicts and difficulties, which most often were hardly noticeable to others. Sometimes I received miraculous help and support from Sathya Sai Baba almost instantly, and sometimes my problems took years to resolve. In my relationship with Sathya Sai Baba I went through many periods of disappointment and crisis. I have come to realize that some people expect only sweets and entertainment from Sathya Sai Baba, but actually, he leads us along the spiritual path, the purpose of which is not to satisfy our conceit or satisfy all our whims but to lead each student to enlightenment.
17. The Spiritual Heart
All spiritual paths end in gaining wisdom. Meditation is a way of contemplating your divine nature, which is your true reality. Everything is within you and you are in everything.
(Sathya Sai Baba – Gita Vahini Chapter 6)
Philosophy gives intellectual knowledge of the truth and yoga leads to the actual experience of truth. Philosophers meditate on the truth and yogis are in the mystical experience of truth, which takes place in the depths of the Spiritual Heart. The search for truth is self-exploration, self-knowledge, and self-contemplation.
The right side of the body is considered more sacred in the Vedic tradition because there is the door to eternity: the Spiritual Heart. Wisdom is the fruit of meditation. In order to gain great wisdom in your inner mystical state, immersion in meditation is necessary for there to be a realization that "everything is inside you and you are in everything."
Sathya Sai Baba is an Avatar, he can consciously pass from one incarnation to another, but is it possible for everyone?
Sathya Sai Baba consciously reincarnates. Conscious reincarnation allows you to transfer to the present life all the accumulated spiritual experience of past lives. You temporarily live in a beautiful physical body, on the wonderful planet Earth.
You are going through the path of spiritual evolution not only in this life, but many incarnations. The only thing that you brought with you into this life is the wisdom from past lives, but if the process of reincarnation is not conscious, then most of the treasure is lost.
The soul is in the process of reincarnation, traveling from life to life, incarnating in different worlds and in different circumstances. At a higher level, reincarnation happens consciously. At a high evolutionary level, the “Self” passes into the next incarnation consciously, retaining the memory and knowledge of the spiritual experience accumulated in the previous birth. Everything is within you, including your past and future lives. Being in the awareness of your divine essence, you observe the process of reincarnation.
Awareness in the process of reincarnation is the result of self-realization received in the practice of meditation. The divine person consciously passes the path of reincarnation; therefore, he is free from the fear of death, retains an understanding of the present moment in any situation, including at the moment of death of the body.
Of course, some may doubt and say that Sathya Sai Baba is a great Avatar and can consciously pass from one incarnation to another, but is this possible for everyone? Realizing your True Self, you come to understand that "everything is within you, and you are in everything." Everything happens inside your consciousness, including the process of reincarnation.
Everything happens inside you: life and death. A person who is conscious in the present moment remains conscious in the journey of the soul to a future incarnation. If you think about death and the afterlife journey of the soul, then you imagine it as a future event, but when death actually happens, it happens in the present moment.
Awareness of one's divine nature leads to awareness in the process of reincarnation. When you begin to understand the process of the soul's transition from one life to another, the fear of death disappears, because you begin to understand that the journey to the next life is not much more difficult than the trip from Moscow to St. Petersburg. The question is that it is reasonable to prepare for each trip in advance.
The basis of conscious reincarnation is the self-realization of one's higher nature. The Avadhuta Gita beautifully and poetically describes the reality of the Self:
“Having got rid of the feeling of individual consciousness and pride, the sage finds everything within his own Higher Self. "I Am" here and now, "I" was always in the beginningless past, and "I" will always be in the eternal future. "I" unborn and immortal, primordial and eternal, "I Am" being – consciousness – bliss, "I Am" boundless like space. "I" was before the appearance of the physical body, and "I" will be after the disappearance of the physical body.”
A person who is conscious at every moment of his life becomes a high-level yogi. The one who has realized his Higher Self consciously lives life and also consciously goes through the process of the posthumous journey of the soul because everything is inside you, both life and death.
18. Trinity in the Vedas and the Bible
This story is repeated by me in memory of and in gratitude to two senior devotees of Sathya Sai Baba, who lived in his ashram for many years. First, Maheshwarananda, the author of the famous book Sathya Sai and Nara Narayana Guha Ashram, told me about this event, and then later, Padananda repeated the same story to me.
It happened in the early spring of 1978. Sathya Sai Baba spent some time in a place called Ooty, a large nature reserve with magnificent mountains and primeval jungle. Sathya Sai Baba was returning by car to his ashram, and it was necessary to pass the city of Mysore and then Bangalore. It was a full day trip.
The line of cars speed along the road. Sathya Sai Baba's car drove at the head of the column, and all the escorts followed him. Not far from Mysore, Sathya Sai Baba chose a picturesque place, asked to stop, and invited everyone to relax in nature with him. A couple of dozen people who accompanied Sathya Sai Baba sat beside him on the grass.
Suddenly, an amazing miracle happened in front of everyone present. The usual human form of Sathya Sai Baba disappeared, and in its place a three-headed deity with six arms appeared: it was Lord Dattatreya. Everyone present was blessed by this amazing transformation. The three heads of Dattatreya symbolize the three main Vedic deities: Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva.
Dattatreya is also called the Vedic Trinity. I often quote an ancient philosophical treatise on the nature of the True Self called the Avadhuta Gita. The authorship of this text is attributed to the sage Dattatreya, who is symbolically depicted with three heads, because, in accordance with mythology, he was the incarnation of three great Gods at once: Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva.
When you think about God, you begin by seeing God as a higher being located somewhere in heaven, but as you become more advanced in your spirituality, you gradually realize that God is not in outer space, but in the Spiritual Heart. The same is true with the Trinity. At the first level, the Vedas speak of the Trinity as the three greatest Gods: Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva.
The Christian tradition says that the Trinity is God the Father, God the Spirit, and God the Son. However, from the point of view of high esotericism, the Trinity is the three main aspects of the inner world of man – for everything is inside. The idea of God as a Trinity has always been in the Vedic tradition. Esoteric knowledge about the Trinity has a deep and varied symbolism; the essence of which is Divine Consciousness, Cosmic Energy, and Soul.