Self-Realization Fellowship Blog

The following post is an excerpt from the talk “Cultivate Friendship With God,” which can be read in full in Solving the Mystery of Life, Volume IV of Paramahansa Yogananda’s Collected Talks and Essays — now available in hardback, paperback, and ebook editions.

Always remember: Whenever you have a little leisure time, use it to cultivate your friendship with God. This is my humble suggestion to you, garnered from my own experience….

In order to cultivate friendship with God, in order to love Him, we must get acquainted with Him. In stillness and calmness, give your soul to Him.

In the space of a few months, perhaps, I could teach you about the Divine from the words of wisdom in the Vedas and the other scriptures; but it would do you little good unless you realized those truths within your Self.

Realization is found only in inner calmness. Calmness is loved by God. Calmness is the altar and sanctuary of the Father. Practice seeking Him in calmness. Meditation is the way. That is the best advice I can give to you. Books and classes and philosophical explanations you can have, but this do not forget: Use all your free moments to meditate and cultivate a friendship with God.

For the first few minutes in meditation your mind will wander, but persevere longer until the thoughts become still. You will think: “Oh, I have this work to do today; I will meditate sometime later tonight.” So long as you do not feel the supreme importance of knowing Him, that “tonight” will never come to you; diverting engagements will fill your mornings, noons, and evenings, until when night comes you helplessly surrender to sleep.

So when you sit to meditate, keep the mind concentrated. Drive away stray thoughts and insist, “Father, be with me. I want an answer; I want to feel Thy blessing within me.” Again and again tell Him that, each time in a deeper way.

To pray absentmindedly is of little use — “Father in Heaven, I love Thee” — all the while thinking of a nice cake you want to eat. Say the first word “Father,” that is enough; but say it until you feel it. Then go on to the next phrase of your prayer.

That is one difference between East and West. For instance, Western music did not appeal to me when I first arrived in America; but now I understand it, how it progresses like a story to a climactic conclusion. In the East we don’t use music in this way; we take one phrase and repeat it over and over until we are lost in the feeling it expresses.

What is the use of reciting a whole book of prayers without feeling any love for God? Real prayer is not intellectual; it is feeling what you say to God. That feeling has to be cultured: In the beginning you do not feel love for God because you do not know Him.

Those who are near and dear to us we love. To them automatically we express what we feel; it wells up spontaneously from our hearts. Why? Because they are real to us, we can see them right before us or in our mind’s eye. But God we do not behold because we have not tried to know Him. We might infer His presence in flowers and other beauties of nature; but to have direct contact with Him requires deep meditation....
 

Persevere Until God Is Found

My work is fulfilled when I have awakened in you even the tiniest spark of the love I feel for my Father.

It took a great deal of time to get acquainted with Him; it seemed in this life I would never be able to succeed, for the mind was so restless. But as often as the mind tried to trick me into abandoning my meditation, I would trick the mind: “I will sit here, no matter what noises or distractions come. I care not if I have to die trying; I will keep on to the end.”

As I persevered in this way, once in a while a glimpse of the Divine Spirit would come; like a spark, so near and yet so far, appearing and then flitting away. But I stayed resolute. How I waited! with infinite determination in the invisible silence. The deeper the concentration became, the clearer and stronger became His assurance. Now He is with me always….

All I want to culture within you is that relationship with Him wherein each time you say “I love you, God,” every cell, every feeling, every thought will awaken in the endlessness of His joy.

We invite you to learn more about Solving the Mystery of Life by Paramahansa Yogananda, the fourth volume in the Collected Talks and Essays on Realizing God in Daily Life series. This beautiful work of timeless wisdom is now available to order.