Talk at the retailers' centre

Dear President and dear Vice-President: I am extremely glad to be present at your Centre. I offer to all of you present here my deep sense of gratitude. We were under the impression that there would be a large gathering here, but owing to circumstances, the actual situation is different. But let us try to observe the situation from the spiritual point of view. It reminds me of an incident that took place in India. A spiritual speaker came to our place to give a talk on spirituality. Unfortunately there were only two persons present to attend the meeting. So the spiritual teacher said, “Well, had there been no listeners at all, I would still, with my deepest joy, have said what I intend to say to the walls. The walls would have responded to my heart’s soulful words. The walls would have been my listeners.”

Let us not feel disappointed and let us carry on with today’s significant talk, on the topic “I know what to do”. When I say that I know what to do, most of you will misunderstand me and this misunderstanding of yours will be quite natural. But at the very outset, I wish to defend myself. I wish to state my faith most humbly. I have just said that I know what to do. Now I wish to tell you the inmost secret of my statement. I know what to do precisely because God does it for me. You may, in no time, ask me why God works for me and not for you. No, God is not at all partial. I know that I do nothing, I know that I can do nothing. God is the Doer, God is the Action, God is the Fruit thereof. Unfortunately, there is a slight difference between you and me, between your approach to God and my approach to God. I am sure that all of you are well aware of the statement made by the Son of God. He said, “I and my Father are one.” I try to live this paramount truth. In the same vein, our Vedic seers of the hoary past said, “I am the Brahman. The Brahman is me. I am the One without a second.” I have also learned from Sri Krishna, one of the greatest spiritual Masters of India, nay of the entire world, in the Bhagavad-Gita, the Song Transcendental, that a man is made by his faith. Whatever his faith is, so is he.

Now you are apt to cherish a surprising ideal. With your kind permission, I wish to cite your part-time ideals. You get pleasure, joy, in telling the world there is no God. You try to parade your views. You say, “Had there been a God, how could this world of ours be so full of suffering, pain and untold misery? ” Even now if you feel that there is someone called God, that there is a God, you say that this God is for others and not for you. God is for others. Now your sincere belief makes bold to say that God does not care for you. God thinks of the rest of the world, but He has no time to think of you or care for you. To be sure, this is the acme of stupidity. Something more. You feel that God is terribly angry with you because twenty years ago, you told a lie or you deceived someone in your business or in your profession. And that is why God is terribly angry with you. Now He wants to punish you ruthlessly all the time. Poor God, as if He had nothing else to do! Believe it or not, God the Almighty, God the All-Compassionate, God the Transcendental Reality has many things to do with you, your life. Not one thing, but countless things He wants to do with your life and for your life.

God sings the song of Immortality within you, He sees in you the embodiment of Existence, Consciousness and Bliss. You are God’s unparalleled pride, you are God’s only dream, you are God’s only Reality. For you, God exists throughout Eternity. He shapes you, He moulds you, He guides you, He transforms you into His very image, into the everlasting Life of the Beyond.

Friends, sisters, brothers, you are now in the same Boat as I am. Together, united, let us sing, “I know what to do because God does it for me. In addition to that, I know what to say, what to pray for, what to aspire for.” With the blessing and benedictions of the Upanishadic seers, I wish to chant and sing the soul’s message, a message of the Indian seers that has been ringing in the firmament of India for many centuries.

Lead me from the unreal to the Real.
Lead me from darkness unto Light.
Lead me from death to Immortality.

In Hato Rey, Puerto Rico,

July 15, 1968