Self-Realization Fellowship Blog

An excerpt from the talk “Make God the Companion of Your Soul,” which is a chapter in Journey With Paramahansa Yogananda, the third collection of talks by Sri Daya Mata (now available for pre-order). Sri Daya Mata served as president and sanghamata (“mother of the society”) of Self-Realization Fellowship/Yogoda Satsanga Society of India from 1955 until her passing in 2010, and is revered by followers of Paramahansa Yogananda’s teachings worldwide for her uplifting counsel and sublime example of embodying the promise those teachings hold for all who put them into practice.

Rare on this earth are those individuals who have the ability to arouse in others true love for God. For years before meeting Gurudeva [Paramahansa Yogananda] I had sought for someone who had that love for God. From the first moment I set eyes on Paramahansaji, I knew that my search was over. Here was one who loved God and communed with Him as did Christ and the mystics of old. In that instant I saw that it was possible to know God, and my resolve to find Him became unwavering. Such was the impact Guruji had on my life, and on the lives of thousands who met him.

For me, divine love is the ultimate reality in life. Every human being is seeking love, whether indirectly through another person or directly through communion with the One who is the Fountain of all love — God alone. This became clear to me as a result of an experience I had in India.

During a break from my duties there, I was able to spend a short time meditating in a little village high in the Himalayas. (Paramahansaji urged us to get away now and then from the noise and restlessness of the cities and take a retreat in the mountains or desert or some other secluded place where we could enjoy quiet communion with God.)

One day, while I was meditating, talking to God from the depths of my heart, I opened my eyes on the beautiful mountain scene before me. Suddenly it became transformed, and God gave me a wondrous experience. My whole being began to melt in the consciousness of His infinite love. With that merging came the most thrilling realization: “Oh, my Beloved, it is Thou, it is Thou, who art Love pouring through all beings on earth!” I saw that everything — not just human beings, but trees, plants, animals, every atom — lives within and responds to this Love divine.

I have related this experience only to show that in developing love and devotion for God, we cannot help but feel love for other beings, a reverence for all life — for He flows through all.

This awareness is essential today, when man seems so insensitive to the destruction of life. There is such violence and hatred in the world; it is up to us to be messengers and exemplars of divine love. Practice noncooperation with all forms of hatred. Learn to give unconditional love to others by meditating and contacting the Source of love.

Remember this always: God loves you so much. He is lonely for your love; He is crying for your love. You don’t know how He yearns for you to look beyond the gifts of His creation and seek Him, the Giver. This doesn’t mean that you have to renounce all else; it only means that you must not renounce God! Include Him in your life; that is what He wants.

Paramahansaji taught us disciples to take God with us into all of our activities. If we went on a picnic or some other little outing, meditation was a part of that excursion. If meditation wasn’t possible during the outing, then when we returned home, [he] would take us into the chapel, or sit with us on the lawn outside, and we would meditate. I would think, “Oh, how balanced he is! He is showing us the way to be ‘in the world but not of it.’” He always brought our minds back to God so that we would look to Him as the Polestar of our lives.

We invite you to learn more about Journey With Paramahansa Yogananda, the third collection of talks by Sri Daya Mata, in which she shares lessons from her twenty years of spiritual training and practice with Paramahansaji — now available for pre-order.