Rose Petals

SELECTIONS FROM SATSANGS WITH SRI BABUJI

2011

Saipatham Publications
SHIRDI CHENNAI HYDERABAD
 Title: Rose Petals 2011
Selections from Satsangs with Sri Babuji
Edited by: Ram Brown Crowell, Alison Williams
Layout & Design by: Robyn Aruna Almaleh
Edition: First Edition, Guru Purnima 2012
Published by: Saipatham Publications
Saipatham, Shirdi – 423109
[email protected]
Copyright © 2012 Saibaba Foundation
ISBN: 978-81-88560-08-0
Processing: Sai Mudra, Shirdi
Printed at: Saibonds Print Systems
Chennai – 106
Website: www.saibaba.com
To Sai Baba of Shirdi
who gave us Guruji
If you’re not able to walk, Baba will
carry you. He’ ll give you food, he’ ll give
you water, and if you’re sick, he’ ll give
you medicine. He says, “Don’t worry
about anything – I’ ll take you to the
destination!” To me, Baba fulfils my
concept of a Satguru, not only in an
abstract, mystical sense, but practically
also, right from the simple thing of getting
a berth on the train, up to getting the
final experience.
– Sri Babuji
 Contents

Acknowledgements xi
Notes on Text and Sources xiii
Introduction xv

1 The Satguru 3
2 Focus on the Joy 9
3 “My Samadhi Will Answer” 15
4 Living One Life 23
5 Meditation 31
6 The Unique Mahima of Shirdi Sai Baba 41
7 Love and Devotion 51
8 Two Paise: Nishtha and Saburi 59
9 Concretizing Fulfilment 67
10 Guruji’s Baba 75
11 Expression of Love 87
12 Namaskar 97
Appendix of Sources 105
Glossary 109
 Acknowledgements

The editors wish gratefully to acknowledge the

assistance and technical expertise of the following
devotees who collaborated on the initial database
project which made Rose Petals possible, and on
the various pre-publication stages of the text, from
recording and transcribing of satsangs, database
design and construction, data-input and extraction,
to selection and collation of extracts for topics, text
editing, and graphic layout and design. They are:
Aruna Almaleh, Bob Barnett, Shanti Baron, Bhakti
Bonner, Chris Burgess, Ram Brown Crowell (co-
editor), Karin Dirkorte, Pam Donaldson, Carlos
Gil-Sobera, Kashalya Milon, Nadja Nathan, Lola
Navarro, Anki Sternander, Larisa Webb, Peter
Westöö, and Alison Williams (co-editor).
A special note of appreciation is due Yvonne
Weier, the project coordinator and guiding light of
both the database project and Rose Petals since their
inception, and also Guruji’s first Western devotee,
who served him faithfully from 1993 to the end of
his life. Her judgement, interpersonal skills, and
intimate knowledge of Guruji’s life and teaching,
contributed significantly to the publication of Rose
Petals, and ensured accuracy of the final text.
Finally, it is an honour to acknowledge the
support of Sri Babuji’s devoted wife, esteemed
Ammagaru, and his beloved daughter, Sruti, for
this project. Their ongoing examples of grace and
devotion following Guruji’s passing have been
a constant source of inspiration for everyone
involved in Rose Petals.

xi
 All of us who have contributed to Rose Petals feel
privileged to have had this opportunity to offer a
small token of gratitude for all we have been given
so freely by Guruji, who accepted nothing from us
in return except our imperfect love and devotion.
How fortunate we are to have known him, and to
have benefited from his wisdom and grace! Our
wish is that, with the publication of this small
book, others may also share in that grace, and taste
the incomparable joy of being in the presence of an
authentic, enlightened Master.

xii
 Note on Text and Sources

The sources of the extracts forming each topic are

given in the Appendix of Sources at the end of
the text. They appear there numbered in the order
in which they appear in the text for that topic,
according to the number and date of the satsang,
or its derivative source as given in the List of
Abbreviations.
Foreign words and Sanskrit terms are defined
in the Glossary at the back of the book. Words
enclosed in square brackets in the text have been
added by the editors.

xiii
 Introduction
The English Satsangs of Sri Sarath Babuji
When the charismatic south Indian saint and
Satguru, Sri Sainathuni Sarath Babuji, known
affectionately as “Guruji”, took mahasamadhi on
13th November, 2010, at the young age of 56, his
devotees around the world mourned his untimely
loss. The adored and beloved figure who had so
dominated their lives by the purity of his love
and peerless devotion to his Satgurudeva, the
great Sai Baba of Shirdi (d.1918), was no more
in his mortal frame. It seemed impossible to
believe that his radiant spiritual presence would
not continue, so vibrant and intensely alive
had his living presence been. It was therefore
equally heartening to realize that his vardhate,
the subtle expansion of a saint’s presence
which occurs when his body dies, was already
taking place and was even then being widely felt.
At this momentous juncture, to honour Sri
Babuji’s memory and to share his priceless
teachings with devotees, it was decided to bring out
selections from his English satsangs, unpublished
up to then, in a monthly email format, each month

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Rose Petals

forming one topic, called Rose Petals. It was hoped

that the “petals” of his words would evoke the
fragrance of his presence, and so help devotees
transcend the ocean of grief aroused by his passing.
The first issue of Rose Petals appeared on January
1st, 2011, less than six weeks after the moving scenes
of his mahasamadhi ceremony were witnessed by
thousands of bereaved devotees on 17th November
2010, in Shirdi, where his body was entombed in the
location he had pointed out some time before.
The twelve monthly issues of Rose Petals that
appeared initially in digital format have now been
collected, re-edited, and presented here bound
in print format for more permanent reading,
as Rose Petals – 2011. This marks the first publica-
tion of Sri Babuji’s satsangs in English, with
simultaneous publication of the text in Telugu, as
Sarathchandrikalu (Moonlight Petals). It is hoped
that Guruji’s original and insightful understanding
of the nature of spiritual unfoldment will be of
interest and benefit to a wide range of devotees
and sincere seekers of truth.
The texts of Rose Petals – 2011 have been drawn
almost entirely from Sri Babuji’s English satsangs,
which took place gradually as Western devotees
from countries around the world came to be
with him in India. Naturally, they felt barriers of
language and custom, and were sometimes non-
plussed by the unfamiliar devotional culture that
surrounded Guruji, unlike anything in the West.
They were yet undeniably drawn to him, attracted
by the transparent purity of his love, and the
electrifying magnetism of his spiritual presence.

xvi
 Introduction

Understandably, they had their own questions

to which they longed for answers, which only he
could give. Guruji compassionately recognized
their need and graciously responded, providing
opportunities to be with him and have their
questions answered in their own language. These
meetings were the beginning of his English
satsangs, of which eventually 140 were recorded
over the years from 1993 to 2010, the last given
a week before his passing. (Sri Babuji also gave
numerous satsangs in Telugu, his mother tongue;
their publication is happily anticipated.) The
satsangs were recorded live, then transcribed, and
later coded into searchable extracts and entered
into a specially-designed database. Extracts from
various satsangs were then collated and edited to
form the topics of Rose Petals. The final text reflects
the vibrant speaking style of Guruji’s original
satsang, and some of his endearing, idiosyncratic
ways of speaking English.
The format of satsangs was always spontaneous
and essentially unannounced; they could take place
any time, day or night, anywhere Guruji was.
This meant one had to be there, on the spot, in
the moment, to attend. This could, and often did,
amount to waiting over many days, and staying
near Guruji even when he travelled, hoping for
the rare chance of satsang. Though satsangs could
happen at any time, the vast majority took place
very late at night – Guruji’s daytime, as it were,
since he was often up nights – and in a variety
of places: in Shirdi, in Tirumala, by the sea on
the coast south of Chennai, in Rishikesh, on the

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Rose Petals

Ganga in Varanasi, in Uttar Kashi, or on the roof

of his simple flat in Tiruvannamalai, or even while
travelling on boat or train. Usually no more than
thirty people were present, so the atmosphere was
informal and intimate, as in a family. Wherever
the satsangs were held, pindrop silence prevailed
until Guruji should first open satsang by speaking.
Usually this happened when he looked up and
asked quietly, in his deep, rich, melodious bass
voice, “What news?”
In giving satsang it was Guruji’s custom not to
speak unless asked; he never spoke unilaterally,
or discoursed or gave lectures. He took questions
by turn, remaining silent until another question
was asked. If no more questions were forthcoming,
he would start to get up and go, so it became the
congenial task of those present to keep him there
for as long as possible. Since his replies were always
specific and relevant to the needs of the person in
front of him, very often this resulted in his giving a
different answer to the same question from another
person, or even in contradicting what he had said
earlier in response to the same question. But this
individual approach revealed the vast treasury
of Guruji’s experience and attainment, since each
reply incorporated a different aspect of the subject,
adjusted to the needs of the questioner. Although
the topic often changed with the question, if the
subject raised were of sufficient interest, it would be
returned to again and again, with Guruji’s replies
each time adding another dimension to his earlier
answers. It is from such replies that the texts in this
book have come.

xviii
 Introduction

Guruji’s satsang was extraordinary, and the

atmosphere electric, flashing with wit, insight, and
humour; in his company one entered a new and
powerfully-enhanced field of experience. At the
same time, behind the verbal and visual foreground,
one felt a deep current of boundless peace and
silence, radiant with an unfathomable love and
held by an impregnable sense of security. Sri Babuji
often noted the real importance of satsang lay in
the silent communion taking place beyond words,
remarking, “This is just a pretext for all of us to
sit together, to express our love and to experience
love.” When he spoke, it seemed the whole range of
spiritual wisdom and knowledge was available to
him and he had an uncanny ability to understand
intuitively one’s innermost needs and problems,
and to respond on multiple levels simultaneously,
or on a subconscious level of which the questioner
was unaware, so that afterwards those present
often felt their underlying issues as well as their
conscious problems had been addressed. His vast
experience allowed him to interpret traditional
practices like arati, namaskar, namajapa and smarana,
from an inner dimension that made them accessible
and come alive as expressions of love, rather than
as obligations prescribed by some sacred text or
sastra. This was true for everything he said about
spiritual life.
Guruji seemed inexplicably free from the biases
and religious conventions of his own culture,
so that he looked at every aspect of spirituality
anew. He emphasized that we should never
accept spiritual truths uncritically or simply on

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Rose Petals

the authority of a text or teacher, even himself,

but to verify everything by our own experience.
“Trust your own experience!” he would say, “Let
your path be personal and your realization be
your own.” And, “Write your own Gita!” Or even,
“Truth is more important than Baba,” though no
one loved Baba more.
He repeatedly urged us to be honest with
ourselves and get clear about our true needs, goals,
and priorities. Lack of clarity led to lack of focus.
This fragmented effort and made attainment of the
fulfilment we longed for hostage to ignorance of
our own experiential reality. The first desideratum
was to dispel the hypocrisy signified by the gap
between our words and deeds through honest and
sincere introspection. This produced clarity about
our needs and goals by aligning our thoughts with
our feelings, which in turn strengthened focus and
gave effort a basis to arise less from discipline than
from love. Guruji could be quite confrontational
in exposing hypocrisy and in challenging one’s
preconceived ideas and concepts of spiritual life if
he thought it necessary. At the same time his ever-
ready wit and humour could turn any situation to
laughter, and he would tell stories from the Puranas
or his own experiences on the path with a gifted
mimicry and entertaining élan. He seemed to have
a photographic memory for everything he’d heard
or read, and could recall everything said to him
previously by the same person.
Guruji knew Sanskrit well, had read widely
in the canonical and commentarial literature of
Hinduism and Buddhism, and had an extensive

xx
 Introduction

scholarly library in English, Sanskrit and Telugu.

He was highly proficient in English and was known
for the beauty and poetic diction of his spoken and
written Telugu. He carried out significant, original
research on the origin of arati, citing the relevant
Sanskrit and scholarly texts, and also on Sai Baba,
and was an unparalleled authority on Baba’s life
and teachings. It could truly be said of Guruji that
everything he undertook he carried through to
perfection.
Sri Sainathuni Sarath Babuji was born in
Chennai, Tamil Nadu, on Vijayadasmi, 7th October,
1954, on the same day the famous life-size marble
statue of Sai Baba was installed in the Samadhi
Mandir in Shirdi – an auspicious coincidence
which in retrospect foretold his destiny of devotion
to Baba. Enormously gifted, spiritually precocious,
and endowed with exceptional virtues of mind
and heart, Guruji’s rise to spiritual attainment
was meteoric. He was that rarest and highest
grade of aspirant, what the Kashmiri Trika (Saiva)
sastra calls tivya tiva (“intensely intense”) – those
having an all-consuming, one hundred per cent,
burning desire to know Truth and be free – rare
souls capable of sustaining absolute, one-pointed
devotion, along with the unhindered capacity to
integrate and express its results fully into their
life and experience. Already, at age four, while
standing before the deity of Sri Venkateshwara at
Tirumala, a venerable saint appeared to Guruji in
place of the idol, beckoning him forward; Guruji
retained a deep reverence for him ever afterward.
Subsequently, as a small boy, while seeing Sai Baba’s

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portrait hanging on the wall of his grandmother’s

house, he felt a peculiar, prescient attraction, “a
strange familiarity”. By 17, he was serving his
master and mentor, Sri Ekkirala Bharadwaja (1932-
1989), himself a peerless Sai devotee, and together
with him researching the lives of saints and
visiting various saints and holy places. Three years
later, at age 20, he was sent by his master to visit the
great avadhuta, Sri Poondi Swami, and remained
in his presence for a month. This culminated in a
profound, transformative experience, one facet of
which, Guruji later said, was Poondi Swami’s mind
(citta) was so pure and transparent, that in it Guruji
beheld Sai Baba. And when, some time earlier,
siddhis had begun spontaneously to manifest in
Guruji, he prayed to Baba for their removal as
distractions from his love.
Such renunciation of lesser gifts in favour of an
exclusive quest for truth reflects the clarity and
focus of Guruji’s approach to spiritual life, and
the sincerity of a devotion so intense it allowed
nothing less than pure love to motivate its fulfil-
ment. One could see a tremendous unity in Guruji,
an integrity in everything he said and did, that
gave his life an aesthetic quality and beauty of
proportion, since no side of it was fulfilled at the
expense of another. Guruji’s brilliant, original
approach to the path of devotion as expressed in
his satsangs, nourished all sides of his life equally,
uniting them seamlessly into one harmonious
expression of fulfilment. Every aspect of his life
in thought, word, and deed, was integrated by
his devotion to Baba, so his love manifested as

xxii
 Introduction

truth, and vice versa. His integrity extended to

details of his private life: he accepted no donations,
established no ashram, owned no property,
avoided any commercialization of his spiritual life
and all publicity, and insisted, as a householder, on
earning his livelihood “by the sweat of his brow”.
This he did by founding a school – now one of the
best in Andhra Pradesh – from which he received
an honorarium to support himself and his wife
and daughter. Even his marriage was an act of
devotion: it was done to accede to his Guru’s wish.
In the classical yogasastra, attaining such a degree
of inner and outer integrity is called trikarana
shuddhi, the “triple purity” of thought, word, and
deed. When it becomes firmly established and
irreversible, such a rare yogi becomes, according to
the Veda, an aptavadin, “a sage (kavi) whose words
are trustworthy as truth”. The words of such a sage
have an hierophantic, revelatory power, divinely
sanctioning his function as a Satguru and a vehicle
guiding humanity to fulfilment.
The magnetic attraction natural to total truth
may also account for Guruji’s matchless living
presence and its ineffable power – so great that it
held literally thousands of people spellbound in
Shirdi when he came out for his public darshans
or, when he used to travel, would cause immense
crowds to gather wherever he went. In Shirdi,
they gazed in rapture as he sat unmoving, eyes
closed, on a stage in front of a large portrait of Sai
Baba, without even saying a word. It was one of
the great displays of spiritual power in modern
India, embodying a degree of realization very

xxiii
Rose Petals

seldom seen. “I am a coolie of Baba,” he would say,

laughing. Or, “I think of you all as Baba’s prasad. I
am only sharing my love of Baba with you, that’s
all. I am not your guru, you are not my disciples.
I am a simple Sai devotee” – indeed, he was
Sainathuni (belonging to Sai). These were realities
of his everyday experience for Guruji. If, as Soren
Kierkegaard so rightly remarked, “Purity of heart
is to will one thing,” then Guruji was its perfect
example. As with everything else, his own life was
testament to his teaching.
It has been said that Guruji had no “teaching” as
such; indeed, he said so many times himself. But
in retrospect what is interesting is that, because
all that he said came from the same unified,
self-realized source, and arose from his direct
experience, this fundamental integrity reflects a
larger teaching, whose depth and contours are
discernable in Guruji’s own life. They constitute
the path he himself walked, which we may call
Saipatham, the path of Sai. It is too early and beyond
the scope of this introduction to characterize that
path and its teachings further here, but that it is
an original, viable, effective, and comprehensive
approach to spiritual fulfilment will become
clearer as future volumes of Rose Petals appear.
Sri Babuji’s insights constitute a distinguished
and significant contribution to the psychology of
the enlightenment process which are of potential
benefit to every sincere seeker, whatever their path
or sadhana. It is therefore to be hoped that this brief,
initial selection from his English satsangs, so full
of his wisdom and all-encompassing love, will

xxiv
 Introduction

continue to inform and inspire all those who seek

clarity and fulfilment on their spiritual path, and
help to make their aspirations both more real and
attainable.

Sri Satchidananda Satguru Sainath Maharaj ki Jai!

Satguru Sri Sainathuni Sarath Babuji ki Jai!

Ram Brown Crowell

Co-editor, Rose Petals
Shirdi
2nd April 2012

xxv
Rose Petals
Tirupati, 2001
 The Satguru

GURUJI:
Once you have a Satguru, once you know he’s
taking care of you, even though you experience
certain difficulties along the way, it’s backed by
that sense of assurance: he is there. So the sense
of longing and your experience of suffering are
not the same as you were experiencing before
– they change. The quality of your happiness is
transformed, and even the quality of your suffering
and the quality of your desires are transformed.
Until you get that, until you get the Satguru, the
desires seem to trouble you unendingly, they seem
to be self-perpetuating, but once you get him, the
nature of the desires changes. You have desires,
Rose Petals

but now they are fulfilled through him. And at

a certain point what happens is, all those desires
become expressions of your love, they take shape
as expressions of your love.

GURUJI:
What a Satguru does as a good teacher is to try
and inculcate in you the spirit of love, the spirit of
enquiry, the fire of the desire to grow, to become
mature, to know the meaning of the text of your
life. A good teacher doesn’t say it’s hopeless when a
child doesn’t understand a text – she’s only a child!
If she believes she’s a grown-up, what is the use
of a teacher? A teacher is there to teach the child,
knowing the limitations of a child. He doesn’t say
it’s hopeless, he is patient.
No enlightened teacher will tell you to be
disgusted with the world. Instead, they will slowly
inculcate something which will give you the desire
to grow, to become more and more mature, to
become an adult. Then you’ll automatically drop
your toys and start talking and interacting with
real people.
We can’t make a bud into a flower just by
expanding its petals. We must give it manure, some
water, good sunlight – all those things which help
it to become a flower. And what a Satguru does is to
give you those circumstances, some oral teaching,
some mystic experience. He provides good soil,
good manure, good water, light and air, and good
protection – a fence of satsang. By doing all these

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 The Satguru

things he sees that the bud flowers. He doesn’t

directly touch the bud to expand its petals so that
overnight it becomes a flower. Rather, his way is
to make the bud grow naturally, and mature in its
own time into a flower.

GURUJI:
The Telugu saint and poet, Vemana, said, “One
who says this world is false, that it’s an illusion, that
material life is something to be shunned, and you
must seek some reality that transcends this world...
If anybody says this he is telling lies, he’s a rogue!”
Only one who can show you that transcendental
state – if at all you call it a transcendental state –
here in this world, one who brings that state to you
here and gives it to you here – only he is the real
Satguru. If anyone says you must leave this world,
you must leave all desires, you must break all
attachments to this world, and then if you come up
to me I will give you bliss – then what is it he’s going
to give? We are here in this world, we can’t climb
a ladder, we can’t go up there, we can’t give up all
these attachments – how can we go up to him? He
must come down to us, as if from Skandashram to
the foot of the hill, and hand over that state to us
here – where we are – in this world. If we can give
up all our desires and climb up to him, what is his
use? Only he who comes down, who frees us down
here where we are – he only is the real Satguru.
Regardless of our effort, regardless of how we do
japa, or self-enquiry, or this and that, the Satguru

5
Rose Petals

showers his grace on us: it is unconditional. He

just loves us because of the connection, the way a
father loves a child. Does a father view the child’s
qualifications before he loves her? And what is
the qualification of the child? Being born to him,
that’s all. That’s the sole connection. Whether the
child is worthless or very good the father does
not care: he simply loves the child. Just like that,
the Satguru loves us. We are all his children. And
surely, in any case, the one who precedes has the
right of choice, not the child. Will anybody say,
“I have chosen to be born to this father?” No, it
is not our choice; it is his choice. So Baba said,
emphatically, “I choose my devotees.”
It is the guru’s choice to select his devotees. In
the Indian tradition, the disciple will go to the
guru and request him to be accepted as a disciple,
and then wait. It is the heart which must tell you.
Recognizing the guru is something we cannot
explain. It is a certain attraction, an attachment,
some liking. We must crave his acceptance. And
we must realize that he has chosen us even before
we came into contact with him. Only after he has
chosen us can we seek and find him.

GURUJI:
Who is Baba? What is Sai Baba? That is the question.
How are we to understand Sai Baba? I am saying
he’s the one who takes care of us, like a watchman,
always looking, like our eyelid guards our eye.
And he is the one who is anxiously, avidly waiting

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 The Satguru

for when we will be free of all these patterns – and

then ask him what he wants us to ask. Always
waiting expectantly, “When will they ask?” [Guruji
laughs] – that is Sai Baba. So-o-o patient. He asks us
to give him patience. We don’t give it, so he gives
it to us – that is saburi. What can he do? If we can’t
give it, he has to give. [Guruji laughs] He gives and
then takes: “Come on! Come on! Give! Give up at
least one pattern!” [Guruji laughs] So he’s full of
saburi. And he’s so persistent. Whatever we do,
he’ll be persistently, patiently waiting. And he does
it. That is Sai Baba.

GURUJI:
Baba said, “People come to me because of rinanu-
bandha,” because of the karmic relationship, and
I see you as a part of that karmic relationship. I
take you all as Baba’s prasad, nothing else. You are
sacred to me. Whether you feel sacred or not that
is a different matter, but you are sacred to me –
because I receive you as Baba’s prasad, and he is the
one who does the good. If he does good to you and
you are happy, I also am happy.

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Shirdi, 1997
 Focus on the Joy

GURUJI:
Focus on the joy, that is enough. FocusFocusonon the
your Joy
need and the solution which gives you joy; just the
thought of the solution will give you joy.
That is what Baba taught Das Ganu Maharaj
from the Ishavasya Upanishad when he sent him to
Kakasaheb Dixit’s house. It’s a beautiful teaching.
Das Ganu Maharaj longed for an interpretation
of the first sloka of the Ishavasya Upanishad which
had puzzled many scholars. No scholar could
satisfy him and so at last he asked Baba. Baba
simply said, “Oh, is this your question? Why do
you ask me? Go to Dixit’s house, his housemaid
will tell you.”
Rose Petals

Das Ganu felt insulted. He was a great scholar

and he had consulted other great scholars but they
couldn’t give an answer. Now he thought Baba
was insulting him by asking him to go to Dixit’s
housemaid, an illiterate person! Anyhow, simply
because Baba had said so, Das Ganu Maharaj went
to Bombay, to Ville Parle, and then to Dixit’s house.
He stayed overnight and in the morning he saw
the housemaid: she was dancing with joy! When
he asked her why she was so happy, she said it was
because Dixit’s wife had given her a sari, and the
sari was there, in her box. That’s all! Just the very
thought of the sari was enough to make her dance,
she wasn’t even wearing it! Then Das Ganu realized
that Dixit’s maid had answered his question.

GURUJI:
In Baba’s own way, a beautiful way, he explains
the exact mechanism of bliss and happiness.
Kakasaheb Dixit’s housemaid was given a new
sari. She did not even wear the sari – she kept it
in a box – but she was dancing with joy. The very
awareness that her new sari was there, in the box,
gave her such bliss that she was dancing with
joy. Why? It’s meaningless – she hasn’t even put
the sari on yet! But when she puts it on, what will
happen? Will she get more joy simply from putting
it on? No, because the joy is already there, in just
her knowing “the sari is mine, and it’s in my box”.
Just that thought is enough to give her joy, so she’s
happily dancing. That is called love, that is called

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 Focus on the Joy

presence, and that is what the great Ishavasya

Upanishad says.
This is what people are missing [here]. A sari has
been given. It is just there in the next room, but no,
we don’t want it! Because with most things, except
for our physical needs, our happiness depends
only upon our awareness of them, not on actually
possessing them. The very thought that we have
money in the bank gives us happiness; whether we
actually draw one rupee of it or not is a different
matter. The very awareness that it is there, in the
bank, that “It is mine!” – that is enough. We feel
so secure, so happy. It is there and we are here; it
is there and we are here. [Laughter] Like Dixit’s
housemaid: she doesn’t put on the sari and we
don’t spend the money – it stays five, ten, fifteen
years on deposit – still we enjoy it.

GURUJI:
[Referring to the Satguru] Once the awareness is
there that, “Yes, he is mine, he belongs to me, I
belong to him,” that is enough. When you sit here,
whether I am upstairs and you are downstairs,
whether we are in one room or two – even if there
is a wall there – it is the same difference. I am
sitting here and you are sitting there, just in the
next room. But the wall is more important to you.
That is why Baba said, “Pull down the wall!” Just
the wall is there, that’s all. You are there, I am here.
Just like the sari of Dixit’s housemaid – I am here!

11
Rose Petals

GURUJI:
Your actual enjoyment is not dependent upon the
object of enjoyment. It is only your attitude towards
it, how you relate to the object, that gives you
happiness. That is why Dixit’s housemaid was so
happy that she was dancing with joy.
For instance, someone is looking for a job. He
needs it desperately and then one day he gets em-
ployment. He hasn’t even received his first pay, only
an e-mail notice that he’s been employed at such and
such salary, that’s all. But, he’s so-o-o happy! What
has happened to him? That simple awareness – the
possibility that a job is there and that he can get a
salary – allows him to enjoy the whole thing. Just
the very awareness makes him really happy. And
like that, not only with regard to these worldly
things, it’s the same when you meet a Satguru like
Sai Baba. It’s the very awareness that, “Yes! This
is my e-mail letter!” [Laughter] “I’ve got it!” – that
should make you happy. Even though you haven’t
got nirvana, mukti, realization or anything – still
the possibility, the promise, the clear promise that,
“Yes! I’ve got Baba!” – that should make you happy.
So let us all be like Kakasaheb Dixit’s maid – she
happily has her sari, you have got Baba, what is
there to suffer? What to worry about? Ah, happily
enjoy life, happily enjoy! Dance, dance, dance!

GURUJI:
Let us enjoy every minute, every breath. Life is a
gift to us, it is not a curse, it is not a bane. It is a gift

12
 Focus on the Joy

of nature. Let us enjoy it. If you are not able to enjoy

it, then seek how to enjoy it. All these things, these
satsangs, are only meant to make you learn the art
of enjoying your own life, that’s all. Then every
minute our life is renewed, nothing old, nothing
previous, nothing dead remains. Every minute it is
new – every minute!

GURUJI:
Try to appreciate and enjoy the beautiful life that
Baba has given you: it is an embodiment of his
grace. I see in everybody, in each one of you, how
Baba has placed you, where he has put you, what
Baba has given you. If you want more, I will give
you more! But enjoy it, enjoy what Baba has given!

GURUJI:
Learn! Experience, enjoy and radiate the joy of
Baba! I want to see that joy. When I see that joy
I am also joyful. All your faces will be bubbling,
radiating that joy of love, the love of Baba. The
conviction that he is yours, the identity that you
are his – that royal feeling should be there. We
are all sons and daughters of Sainath Maharaj; if
he is royal, we are also royal, we are princes and
princesses! [Guruji laughs]

13
Tenali, 1993
 “My Samadhi Will Answer!”

DEVOTEE:
Would you explain the word samadhi?

GURUJI:
Experiencing that love, that bliss or sense of
fulfilment – whatever you call it – getting fully
absorbed in it without any reflexive defense
mechanisms, that is samadhi.

DEVOTEE:
But why is Baba’s tomb also called a samadhi?

GURUJI:
The word samadhi has several meanings. The first
Rose Petals

meaning is a tomb. The tomb of any person can be

called a samadhi, so one meaning is “tomb”. Samadhi
also means a state of samadhana, a state in which
our quest for concretization of our abstract sense
of fulfilment is answered and all our needs are
fulfilled; this is the second meaning of samadhi.
The third meaning is that state of mind where you
are so inwardly absorbed, without any conflicting
intellectual or emotional pulls, that all your
emotions become totally harmonized. That blissful
state is also called samadhi.
So the meaning of samadhi is where you
experience that all your needs are answered
completely so that no grounds for conflict can arise
again – there ends the matter! There are no further
needs or desires to be answered, so there are no
seeds for future conflict. In the ordinary biological
sense death answers or completes the physical
need for life, so a tomb is called a samadhi. In the
spiritual sense, samadhi is the name given to that
state in which all our spiritual needs are answered
and get fulfilled, and in which we experience that
our abstract ideal of fulfilment has become totally
concretized – that is samadhi. So the word can be
used in different ways: Baba is in samadhi, that
state of consciousness; what we see concretely is
his tomb, his samadhi; and when we go there what
we get is samadhi, our needs are answered. So in all
these senses it has meaning. That is why Baba said,
“My samadhi will answer!” His state of fulfilment
will answer the various needs of the people. It is
the samadhi which answers.

16
 “My Samadhi Will Answer”

GURUJI:
Baba was never confined to his physical body
even before 1918, because he himself said, “My
murshid (guru) has already freed me from this
body. Whoever thinks that this body is Sai Baba,
hasn’t seen Sai Baba at all.” Because he had already
been released from his body, it was already a tomb
– a small, moving, limited tomb that was capable
of interacting with a number of people. Then,
because he is so loving and he wanted to cater to
the growing needs of the people, and the devotees
need some means of interacting with him, he had
to change. So he changed his tomb – from that
“tomb” [his physical body] to the present tomb,
which is an extension of Baba’s body and a form
of it. That is why he said, “My tomb will speak, my
tomb will move, my tomb will answer,” just as his
physical body had been answering.

GURUJI:
We see Baba’s form and think that he is a Satguru,
but by what signs? Because he manifested a partic-
ular state. That state gave him the stature of a
Satguru. What is important is the stature, not the
form. That is why Baba used to say repeatedly, “I am
not this body, I am not only this form. This body is
only a means, a tomb, which manifests something.”
That state was manifested through the form of Sai
Baba because we can’t understand it unless it is
conveyed to us through a concrete channel.

17
Rose Petals

DEVOTEE:
Guruji, today is Bhagavan Ramana’s mahasamadhi.
Nowadays it is celebrated with great spirit and
joyfulness, but when he left his body fifty years
ago it can’t have been like that for the people left
behind then. So, although today is a beautiful day,
there is also a certain poignancy to it, thinking
what it must have been like for his devotees who
were left without his form that was so beloved to
them.

GURUJI:
The day when he left his body would have been a
very painful day for the devotees, no doubt about
it. But in India the anniversary of a saint’s death
is usually celebrated, not mourned, because they
know there is no death for a saint. Because of the
personal attachment that the devotees had when
their master was in the body, it was natural that
many people cried and it was a day of sorrow.
When you have a personal connection with the
saint’s physical form, it is a painful thing when it
passes away. But in the course of time, the tradition
comes in its place and they realize that it is only
the body which has gone, and they experience his
presence more and more in a different way.
As I have already told you, a saint’s death,
the so-called death, signifies for some saints the
growth of his influence and his mission. So that
day is actually celebrated, not mourned. If you
have to mourn the death of a saint then he’s not a
saint, because there is no death for a saint. That is
why such a thing is called vardhate. Vardha means

18
 “My Samadhi Will Answer”

that which grows, develops, unfolds – actually,

growth. It may be stoppage of the growth of the
body, but not the influence of the saint. He is not
really dead.

DEVOTEE:
Guruji, when somebody dies, is it possible to know
where they go, what happens?

GURUJI:
Yes, it is possible to know.

DEVOTEE:
And how can one know this?

GURUJI:
If you know this here, if you know your soul first.
Do you know where your soul is? Do you know
really that your soul is in your body? If there,
where is it? How is it? First try to know that!

DEVOTEE:
Guruji, Baba said if you can’t meditate on me in
the form of bliss, meditate on my form. For those
of us attached to the form, could devotees feel
abandoned if their guru takes mahasamadhi? Or
will they still feel taken care of?

19
Rose Petals

GURUJI:
When I experienced bliss from Baba’s form, it was
after his mahasamadhi.

DEVOTEE:
But how would it have been if you had had the
experience of Baba’s living form as well?

GURUJI:
Then it would have been even greater, because I
would have realized that Baba was not the form
at all at the first instance itself, just by seeing him.
Because I was unfortunate to have only his picture
to look at, I had to cling onto his form for some
time. But if Baba could not give us that experience
at any instant, what would he be?
Anyway, first think about now! [Guruji laughs]
If we know now that all forms are transient, that
sooner or later any form will disappear, from this
we should know the value of form; and that form
is only a means to formlessness. That’s why I give
the example of the window: don’t look at the frame,
look at the window.

DEVOTEE:
But don’t we need to start by looking at the frame?
Isn’t that the only way for most of us?

GURUJI:
First it starts with the frame – but don’t get stuck
there. In order not to get stuck there, just look
through the window more and more. Be focused

20
 “My Samadhi Will Answer”

on the window, then that itself will take you to

what is beyond the window.

DEVOTEE:
In spirituality, why is formlessness usually given
more importance than form?

GURUJI:
No reason. Form is just as important and just as
valuable. Even now form is so important to me –
who said it isn’t? Even now I worship Baba and I
think of Baba’s form. I don’t have any problem with
form, or with formlessness! [Guruji laughs]

DEVOTEE:
But we always hear that we have to transcend form
and go beyond to formlessness.

GURUJI:
Baba’s form is a form, but the bliss which that form
gives is always formless. What form will you give
to bliss? Both are there at the same time. When
you look at Baba, what you experience is the form
which gives bliss, which is formless. Baba also said
the same thing – “Meditate on me as bliss. If you
can’t do it look at my form.” But if you look at the
form what happens is you start to meditate on
bliss again! [Guruji laughs] That is Baba!

21
Tiruvannamalai, 1995
 Living One Life

DEVOTEE:
Are the spiritual life and worldly life separate?
How can we balance them?

GURUJI:
In fact, there are not two lives. You live only one life.
What determines whether it is spiritual or worldly
depends upon your object, the goal, and the source
from which you derive your fulfilment. If you
derive your fulfilment from a worldly object you
call it worldly life, and if you derive it from a so-
called spiritual source, you call it spiritual life. Baba
never differentiated between the two. He saw the
real source, the basis of a person’s endeavour – why
Rose Petals

people strive. Whether it is worldly or spiritual, why

do people strive? It is for fulfilment, for happiness!
Usually people’s concept is that fulfilment
comes only through worldly objects. If someone
says to them, “No, no, that is not fulfilment!” they
still experience it as fulfilment! They want money,
or they have a problem, and unless it is solved
they can’t be happy. If you say, “That is all maya,
real happiness lies somewhere beyond!” they may
listen out of respect, but it can’t go into their heart
and they don’t really understand it. So what Baba
does is he first fulfils our desires by his power.
Then once we know that Baba is the source of the
fulfilment, our focus slowly shifts from the actual
object of the desire to the one who gives that object.
There are different kinds of objects through
which we derive our happiness. When there is one
source, the Satguru, which can give all of those,
our mind starts focusing more and more on him.
Then as the love for him develops, the pull towards
the other objects slowly gets weaker until only the
pull towards the Satguru remains.

DEVOTEE:
Guruji, how can we integrate spirituality into our
everyday life?

GURUJI:
Why do you divide life into spiritual and non-
spiritual? Why make this artificial division and
give more value to one and less to the other? Life is

24
 Living One Life

life. So there is no question of integrating spiritual

life into our daily life. It is not that sadhana
(spiritual practice) should be part of our life, but
that our whole life should be part of our sadhana.
Spiritual practice has to happen twenty-four hours
a day and not only at a special time that we allot
for it – one hour of meditation every day! If we have
an attitude of learning we can see and use all the
situations of our day-to-day life as sadhana. That
is to see the whole world as the guru, to see the
whole life as the guru, to learn from everything
and everyone.
So, basically there is no difference between the
worldly and the spiritual. It all depends on our
attitude. Something worldly can be spiritual and
something spiritual can be purely material.

GURUJI:
As you have a pull towards the world, make it a
means to achieve your spiritual end. Then all the
world will become a means to that.
Usually, for a seeker, the world is considered an
obstacle, an enemy, a nightmare, whereas to a Sai
devotee it is a tool to draw him nearer and nearer
to the object of his love. For example, when we
have an illness, what happens in many spiritual
circles is that one should not complain about it. It is
nothing to do with our sadhana or our Satguru. The
guru tells you that you are not the body. “Focus on
the Self, don’t worry about this illness!” But we are
troubled by our poor health. So we say to ourselves,

25
Rose Petals

“We are not the body,” but at the same time we are
worried about the illness and so a clash is created.
But for a Sai devotee, if he gets ill he goes to Baba
to cure him. Then once he is better he feels, “Oh,
Baba has cured me!” Even the illness, that same
body which is normally considered an obstacle,
even that becomes a means of drawing him closer
to the Satguru.
By looking at things in this way, we can make
all our life an expression of our love towards
our Satguru, a perpetual, unending ritual which
doesn’t seem to be a ritual and which breathes into
us the spirit of love.
That is what I mean by making your whole life a
part of your effort for spirituality.

GURUJI:
Baba never asked people to give up their desires,
to shun desires, “Desires are not good, they are
not spiritual,” no, he didn’t say it. He slowly
transformed these pulls into a bigger pull.
See, for example, a businessman. Once he has
come to Baba, he prays to him before making any
decision and he gets the success. So his success
and the business link him to Baba. Business is
not something which takes him away from his
Satguru. In fact, his main pull, his main desire –
money – is bringing him more and more to Baba.
Whenever he gets a contract he makes a point of
coming to Baba. If there were no contract, maybe
he wouldn’t come at all! [Guruji laughs] So it is the

26
 Living One Life

business, the so-called unspiritual activity, that

is actually pulling him to the so-called spiritual.
And Baba knows how to slowly transform. His life
is based on the business, and since the business is
based on Baba, ultimately, his whole existence is
based on Baba. These pulls, these burning desires,
are like small sticks of fire scattered around here
and there, and he wants to gather them together
and make a big bonfire. That is the way.

GURUJI:
Once the desire is fulfilled and the devotee knows
that their experience came through their Satguru,
the loving bond between them leads to their
transformation. It is not the fulfilment of the desire
that is the purpose; it is the transformation.

DEVOTEE:
But for the devotee, it seems in most cases that the
purpose is the fulfilment of the desire.

GURUJI:
To them it is like that. They may not be seeking any
transformation, but if Baba fulfils their desires, it is
for transformation. They may not be aware of it. It
doesn’t matter. It is enough if they know that it is
Baba who gave the experience.

27
Rose Petals

GURUJI:
We feel that something is missing but we don’t
know what it is, so we experiment – maybe this,
maybe that will give me happiness? The whole
world is experimenting, struggling for that which
is missing. The so-called spirituality is one of the
ways.
Everybody is struggling, everybody is a seeker,
everyone is on the spiritual path, as long as we are
trying for happiness. It is only the method that
differentiates the paths. Happiness is a basic need
of human nature. If it were not, spirituality would
have no meaning. For example, a person who is
striving for money, why do they want money? For
happiness. Why do they want power? Happiness.
Why do they want friends and relationships?
Happiness. There are thousands of different things.
Everybody is striving and striving and striving. The
whole world is full of that struggle and striving for
happiness. Among the millions of methods which
human beings are trying – and still inventing more
and more – we are also trying in our own way.
Maybe by trying this way we will get something, a
happiness which is not dependent on anything else,
that which the saints have spoken of.
The struggle for happiness is a human problem.
We are only responding to the human problem.
Everybody is. It is not our special problem that we
are trying to use special methods to solve. It is not
a special disease; it is a common complaint. Only
the means are different and some are branded as
spiritual and some are branded as worldly, but I
am talking about the basic struggle of all beings.

28
 Living One Life

Everybody is eligible for happiness. Everybody

is capable. Everybody is seeking. And everybody
is bound to get it, as long as they seek and are
sincerely seeking.

29
Tirumala, 1995
 Meditation

GURUJI:
Meditation is an expression and experience of
our love, of our need, of our object of love. See,
for instance, when I leave the room after satsang
you sit quietly. All the talk that normally comes to
the mind is not needed then. You’ll have absorbed
some words, some pieces from the satsang. It’s
not the intellectual theory, or the concepts, or the
teachings. The mind refuses to think; it dissolves,
it falls away. You simply sit with your eyes closed
and feel the joy inside. That experience of joy is
meditation.
Rose Petals

DEVOTEE:
Guruji, what is profound meditation and what role
do thoughts play in it?

GURUJI:
Profound meditation is an ecstatic experience
in which one feels that one’s vessel is full to the
brim. It is the experience of fullness by which
one is so overcome that it doesn’t matter whether
thoughts arise or not. Our attention is so held
by the experience that thoughts become totally
secondary; even if they come they have no power
to distract from the experience.

GURUJI:
The main purpose of meditation is to awaken our
emotion. Real meditation starts when our love gets
awakened. Meditation is not turning a human
being into a stone: static, stoic, indifferent, without
any thought, without emotions. Meditation is
turning a stone into a human being. If the emo-
tions are cultured and harmonized they can find
meaningful expression in life. If one emotion is
stronger, the others will naturally harmonize with
it. Meditation is not keeping the mind blank. It is
experiencing and relishing the taste of life, not
withdrawal from life, not shutting yourself away
from life. Life is so natural; if you shut yourself off
from the world, you shut yourself off from Truth
itself. And since life is something more which you are

32
 Meditation

not able to experience yet, in meditation you come

to experience that part also. It may be called the
search for Truth, but in that search do not reject the
rest of life, thinking it’s all maya (illusion), or shunya
(void). Rather, participate in life! Embrace life!

GURUJI:
When meditation becomes an expression of our
effort to concretize our abstract sense of fulfilment,
then alertness automatically comes, interest auto-
matically comes. When love towards our object of
love is there, one of its symptoms or by-products
is alertness. Not sitting in a morass of dullness,
watching the clock, watching the time – that is not
alertness. When interest and alertness are there,
even if you sit for two or three hours, you won’t
watch the clock.

DEVOTEE:
Guruji, when we sit for meditation should we use
any technique?

GURUJI:
Nothing! Simply sit and feel the bliss; real medi-
tation is actually experiencing the bliss. If the mind
wavers, try to focus on Baba in whatever way you
like, whether calling him by name or by thinking of
him, whatever it is. When the time comes that you

33
Rose Petals

are not even aware you are doing meditation, that

is right meditation. It should feel like when you’re
really hungry and there are no restaurants around.
You run here and there until you finally find a
restaurant and greedily eat the food. After eating,
how do you feel? You say, “Oh, my God! That was
delicious!” You feel immense satisfaction. Then
comes, “Ahhh, now I feel like taking a siesta.” Real
meditation is like a siesta, when effortlessly your
eyes close from the experience of full satisfaction.

GURUJI:
People try to control the mind by observing
thoughts, or try to stop thoughts by concentrating
on a form or concept, though both are concepts
[thoughts]. Meditating on “having no thoughts” is
still a concept and the thoughts become obstacles.
Or some want to brush aside thoughts and concen-
trate on “having a voidness”; they want to have an
insight, a vipassana. And there are other techniques:
watching the breath, and this and that.
But I always advise people to do it the other way
around, and without all these things, go with the
natural tendency of the mind. The natural tendency
of the mind is to concentrate automatically on what
you love, or on what you hate, what you don’t
like. In the second instance, this is accompanied
by displeasure, a negative feeling, a sadness, and
you are not at ease; you lose your peace of mind.
But in the first instance, you experience love and
a kind of fulfilment. So first try to catch hold of

34
 Meditation

an object that spontaneously evokes your love,

and try to make that love grow, grow, grow. Then,
automatically, you will get a thoughtless state – a
void, vipassana, everything will come. This is the
spontaneous [natural] method, not the forceful
stopping of thoughts – that is manipulative. This is
making effort through effortlessness.

GURUJI:
Always remember that the experience of expan-
sion, of vastness, is a sign of good meditation.
Even though you are focusing on something, your
experience should be one of expansion, not of
contraction or constriction. You feel expanded. That
happens when you are aware of what I said before
– the nature of the Satguru, of Baba, vast like the
Himalayas – that awareness. That gives you the
experience of vastness, of expansion. Look at the
sea: you can’t even pinpoint the horizon – your mind
expands, it goes on expanding – that is meditation.

DEVOTEE:
Guruji, what can be done if the mind doesn’t feel
bliss and can’t stay focused on Baba?

GURUJI:
Without forcing the mind, try to contemplate your

35
Rose Petals

object of love and connect yourself to it in any way

you can. Do whatever connects you more and more,
because that connection is what will give you the
fulfilment, the experience of bliss. Your object of
love itself will give you the experience: bliss is its
nature. Once you are experiencing the bliss, there
is no need of the form, the connection or any other
means. But to get it all the time is not possible, and
often we miss it, so at these times we have to use
our own ways to connect again.

GURUJI:
Because they love Baba so much, people like me like
to look at him, like always to think about him and
talk about him – there’s nothing they’d rather do.
They can’t do otherwise, because they want always
to be with him. For these people their love is not an
effort or a means to do anything – to be meditating,
contemplating, or doing nama. For them these are
not spiritual practices done to achieve a goal, they
are simply expressions of their love. And all the
spiritual practices should be done like that – this
is what I feel. And what you get from Baba – the
fulfilment, the final goal – is not dependent on this
directly. As though “Because you have meditated
on me for four hours, I will give you bliss” – no! It’s
not directly related to it. Because for them it’s done
simply as an expression of their love for Baba, not
as a means of getting anything; they know Baba
will give whenever they are ready to receive.

36
 Meditation

GURUJI:
As long as we have the love, meditation will
naturally come. Then gradually everything we do
throughout the day becomes an expression of our
love, not only sitting here for one hour looking at
Baba. There are different ways of expressing that
love; meditation is one of those ways. When all
our actions are expressing our experience of love,
everything becomes part of meditation.

GURUJI:
Since you can’t sit still for twenty-four hours and
stay focused, you need something more. The body
needs some activity because there are so many
distracting pulls and patterns. The solution is
gradually to let all these patterns be channelled in
such a way that the activity we do is, in the end,
related to Baba. So while doing it we are reminded
of him and feel the satisfaction of doing it for him,
or to him, while remembering him. Then, when
the mind clears enough, just sit and experience
the happiness, for as long as you can. After some
time, again the mind starts getting disturbed.
Then again some activity is needed. By working in
this way, the hours of meditation and stillness are
prolonged until finally there is no need to get up
any more. When the need to move is gone, it doesn’t
matter whether you sit or get up, both are the same.
But here the most important thing is: many
people take care of what they do in meditation,
but they pay no attention to what they do outside

37
Rose Petals

it. Then they say, “Oh, we have been meditating,

doing japa for two, five, or ten years, still nothing
has happened.” This is because they take care only
of what they do in meditation. But I tell you, what
decides, what modifies, what spoils, or what keeps
up what you do in meditation, is what you do
outside meditation – usually people don’t take care
of that. But if you focus on what you do outside
meditation, you won’t need to make any effort in
meditation at all – it will naturally come.
Try to go through the routine of your whole
day in such a way that it becomes meaningful and
fulfilling by keeping it more and more focused
on Baba. Do it! Then see how you sit and how you
experience it!

DEVOTEE:
How do we know that we are really meditating
and not just sitting with eyes closed?

GURUJI:
You judge a tree by its fruit. What you are doing
outside your meditation will tell you – you don’t
need any other test. To see your forearm, you don’t
need a mirror. The quality of your meditation can
be seen from what you do in your daily life.

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 Meditation

GURUJI:
Working in the world and meditating, both become
sadhana until we reach the goal. Don’t confine
meditation to the time you sit with eyes closed,
because that is only a part of your life – your life
is not only that. Make meditation part of your life,
but make your whole life part of your meditation.
How?  Baba said, “Meditate on me in the form of
bliss. If you are not capable of doing that, then
meditate on me in this form you see here.” But his
first preference was bliss, the “taste” of life, the
relish of life. When you really enjoy something
all the symptoms of meditation will come. Why
do you close your eyes when you taste something
delicious? Because you relish it and feel fully
satisfied – you are happy! What I am asking of
you is to relish the taste of life. Meditation is the
enjoyment that arises from relishing the taste of
life – that is true meditation.

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Shirdi, 2006
 The Unique Mahima of
Shirdi Sai Baba

DEVOTEE:
In a book I read recently the author referred to Sai
Baba as a miracle worker, but others say that it is
not a correct way to describe him.

GURUJI:
They may say that Baba is a man of miracles, but he
never materialized anything. Such things he called
chamatkar, and he emphatically said, “We don’t do
chamatkar.”
Rose Petals

DEVOTEE:
So then what did he call those superhuman acts?

GURUJI:
To him it is just like a mother caring for her child.
But if you want to call it a miracle, it’s okay. When
a baby feels hungry and milk suddenly just
materializes and flows from the mother’s breast,
is it not a miracle? As long as the child needs
the milk, it comes; and when the need is gone, it
automatically diminishes. It is a miracle that every
mother does and every child experiences, and yet
it is so natural. And Baba experiences it like that,
so naturally.

DEVOTEE:
But we don’t experience it like that, do we?

GURUJI:
That is why you call it a miracle! I call it natural
mothering. Baba is taking care of us like a loving
mother. What you call a miracle is natural mother-
ing to a Satguru like Sai Baba.

DEVOTEE:
Many miracles were seen in Baba’s life. As well
as fulfilling a person’s need, was there any other
purpose to them?

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 The Unique Mahima of Shirdi Sai Baba

GURUJI:
With Sai Baba almost all his miracles carry a
transforming effect on the experiencer. This is
very rare in any saint. The so-called supernatural
acts or so-called miracles that happened around
him always carried a teaching, which pushed a
transformation. You can see that in his biography,
to some extent. Just try to imagine yourself in the
place of any of the devotees who experienced a
miracle with Baba, and you will see.
In this way, Baba’s biography is his teaching.
There was no verbal teaching, no separate teaching,
in fact. Baba taught through his acts. With regards
to chamatkar they only baffle the experiencer’s mind,
but with Baba, the miracles carry a teaching. For ex-
ample, if people came for money, Baba didn’t simply
give it, or say, “Go there and you will find money,”
nor would someone come and just hand it over to
them. No, Baba would try to make it seem as if it
had simply happened naturally, but the experiencer
knew that there was more to it than that.
There was a devotee, for instance, who used to
come to Shirdi from time to time who was a big
manager in a cotton mill in Bombay. At one point
he had some trouble with the management so he
resigned and was unemployed. Almost a year
passed and he was having difficulty maintaining
himself. He was in the financial doldrums. One
day he decided, “What am I doing simply whiling
away my time in Bombay? Let’s go to Shirdi and
at least stay in Baba’s presence for two or three
months until I get another job.”

43
Rose Petals

So he went to Shirdi and by then he was experien-

cing bitter poverty. As he entered the mosque Baba
greeted him, “Oh avo, seth, avo. Come, rich man,
come.” (A wealthy man is called a seth.) “Come seth,
come!”
The man felt embarrassed. “See, Baba is ridiculing
my poverty. He is calling me a rich man, a seth. I am
not a seth now,” and he went and sat down.
Baba asked, “What is your programme?”
Then he said, “I want to stay a few months here,
Baba.”
“No! Go to Bombay!” Baba said. “Start for Bombay
immediately!”
That man was baffled. “I only came just now and
he is already asking me to go away! Oh, even Baba
is only thinking of rich people. I’m a poor man, that
is why he doesn’t want me to stay here.” Then he
said, “Okay, Baba, as you have ordered it, I will go.”
Then, when giving that man udi, Baba said firmly,
“Go via Pune!” Nobody goes to Bombay from
Shirdi via Pune. It is ridiculous! It is a completely
different route. Yet, “Go to Bombay via this route!”
he said.
So the man went to Pune, and, just as he got off
the train, he met somebody who was the proprietor
of a cotton mill and who said he had just been
thinking of him. A manager’s post had been vacant
in his mill for about a month and he was wondering,
“Who is the right person for the job?” Actually, the
mill owner knew this man and thought he would be
suitable for the post, but he didn’t know his address
or how to reach him, so he couldn’t do anything. But
when the man got off the train in the busy railway

44
 The Unique Mahima of Shirdi Sai Baba

station, the mill owner was right there and saw

him immediately.
“Oh, I was actually looking for you! What are
you doing now?”
“I’m not doing anything.”
“Will you accept a post in my mill?” he asked.
“Oh, very happily I will!”
“Okay, then come to Bombay tomorrow. I’ll be
back there by then.”
So he went to Bombay, he got the appointment,
and he did become a seth, in fact.
All this happened within a week. Do you think
it was all a simple coincidence? If Baba had just
said, “Go home!” and he had met that person in
Bombay, it would have been a different matter,
but Baba purposely said, “Go via Pune!” And the
meeting happened in a railway station, where there
are hundreds of people, and where even just one
second is enough to miss a person, yet he got down
from the compartment exactly when the mill owner
was there! So accurate, as if everything had been
planned exactly.
Just think how that devotee must have
experienced it! He not only experienced that Sai
Baba gave him a job, but also how miraculously
the whole thing unfolded.

GURUJI:
Sai “miracles” seem so natural. We receive his
kindness, mercy, protection and grace from the
people around us. When we pray to Baba – for

45
Rose Petals

example, “I am in dire need of money. Please help

me Baba,” – Baba does not place a lakh of rupees
under our pillow as we sleep. Someone will come
to us at the right moment and advise us, “Do it this
way and your problem will be solved.” If we follow
their advice, circumstances turn favourable for us,
our needs are fulfilled and the problem is solved.
Baba does his leelas in this way – he is not
performing magic tricks. This is the special feature
of Baba’s so-called miracles: whatever help we get
is from the people around us and the surrounding
circumstances. This is his approach when respon-
ding not only to our mundane everyday needs, but
also to our spiritual needs. That is why he has said,
“I have no spiritual heirs. I will answer the needs
of my devotees even from my samadhi.”

GURUJI:
With Baba, if we are worried about a problem,
someone will come and show us the way; it flashes
upon us as the answer to our problem although the
person who advises us does not know that this is
the solution we were longing for.
This was Baba’s way even when he was in the
body. He would never give discourses on Vedanta,
or directly answer questions on philosophy, but
people used to ask him and he would answer in
his own way. Once when somebody asked such
a question, Baba answered, “Go and attend the
pothi.” “Pothi” means parayana, devotional reading,
and some of the devotees were sitting together

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 The Unique Mahima of Shirdi Sai Baba

every day and reading aloud a few pages of Eknath

Bhagawat.
This man went there, and just as he came in, they
were reading a chapter in which Eknath Maharaj
was answering precisely the same question he
had asked Baba! The devotee who was reading the
passage didn’t know that this man had already
asked Sai Baba that same question, or that Baba
had sent him there to get an answer to his query.
Another remarkable feature of this is that it was a
regular reading that took place every day and there
was no guarantee that the man would go there
directly. He could have stopped for a cup of chai
in the canteen, or for a chitchat with a friend, or he
could have gone to his room, to the toilet, whatever.
But just as he sat down, the question was addressed
and answered! Baba had said, “Go to the pothi and
your question will be answered.” Just look at the
stage management of Baba!

GURUJI:
Before I went to Poondi, I was very hectically
reading all the scriptures. They all extol the efficacy
of tirthas and going to kshetras (places of pilgrim-
age, holy places) and I had a doubt: why do saints
– who are completely fulfilled and have attained
their ultimate object – why do they need to go to
tirthas? In the Puranas we see that many saints visit
tirthas, and different holy places. I wondered, what
is the need for them to do that? What more holiness
do they need? Are they in need of holiness? Or do

47
Rose Petals

they need some polishing of their holiness? [Guruji

laughs] Why?
I was thinking about this one day when I was
outside, and of all the slokas and all the different
references in the Puranas, when suddenly there
was a big gust of wind. Then, a piece of very
old notepaper, which somebody had used as
packaging for some peanuts or something, came
and just dashed against my face. I caught it and
opened it and then I saw: it was a page from the
Narada Bhakti Sutras, with exactly the sutra where
somebody asks Narada, “Why do holy men go to
holy places?” and Narada gives the answer, “Holy
men go to holy places in order to make the holy
places holy.” [Guruji laughs] That was the sloka!
Then I thought, “Oh! If Baba wishes, he can give
an answer wherever we are.” That is why I always
tell you when you say, “What Guruji, you are going
away! What are we going to do?” No need to worry.
Baba is so great – you will get your answers!

DEVOTEE:
Sai Baba did not give philosophical teachings in
the way that some saints do, did he?

GURUJI:
No, no. Nobody expected such a thing from him.
The moment they went to him they saw the power,
they were aware of their helplessness, they sought
help and they got it. By getting the help they also
got the message. So every leela, every incident,

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 The Unique Mahima of Shirdi Sai Baba

every miracle that you see, every experience that

you read conveys a message – the message which
some other saints taught verbally. Nobody felt any
lack that Baba did not teach, because they were so
fulfilled. There was no need for that. Teaching is
needed in order to get that experience of fulfilment
and to get rid of our helplessness. When that is
spontaneously achieved in his presence, what is
the need of any other thing?

49
Shirdi, 2005
 Love and Devotion

GURUJI:
Happiness comes because of love. When you have
an object of love, thinking of your object of love
will give you the experience of love. And if at all
I tell you anything to do, it is this: when you are
unable to experience love, the only way to bring it
back and to strengthen it, is to give expression to it.
The more you express it, the more it grows, and the
more it strengthens.
Some people think, “I should simply sit and
keep my mind focused on Baba.” But how long can
you sit simply focusing, focusing, focusing? That
focusing is losing its focus! So we need to find other
ways which give us the focus. People are always
Rose Petals

searching for ways to do this – some bring flowers,

some bring fruit, others do puja or sing nama – what
are all these things? Are they done to focus on the
fruit or flowers? [Laughter] No, they are done to
strengthen our focus, weakened to distraction by
other objects, and to centre it on our object of love.
This is needed because our minds are so active and
we have so many pulls.
So when we choose to do certain things mind-
fully, discerning what are our real expressions of
love, then our actions become genuine expressions
of love and we experience it. The more we express
that love the more it grows and the more we
experience it; this is how to strengthen our focus.
There are some resistances, which are our old habit
patterns, and these tend to distract and divert us.
The only way to resist your resistances is to give
your love more expression. If your love is weak
and not expressed, it slowly withers away. The
experience may be there, but it feels soft, weak, not
so strong.
So when anybody complains that they are unable
to experience love, I say, “Then express it!” And in
fact, these expressions are the real rituals. It may
appear sometimes that they are just rituals, but if
they express our love they are not merely rituals.
If it expresses our love, any ritual is fine. And any
ritual, or non-ritual, that doesn’t express our love
should be shunned. Because what we want is love,
and to express love.
To some of you the statement, “Expression streng-
thens love” may seem strange. How can expression
strengthen love? Have you ever thought about this?

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 Love and Devotion

But we know the technique instinctively, everybody

does, because it is so human. The technique I am
referring to is not something new, not a bolt from
the blue.
For example, the father goes to the office, then
comes home and sees his small child; he loves the
child so much, but he is away all day at the office.
Why is he working? To feed the child; that is a
different matter. But as soon as he comes home,
what does the father do? He just picks up his child
and gives her a kiss, and then a doll or a dress he
bought while coming back from work. What makes
him do this? Why does he hug the child and kiss
her? Simply because he loves the child, that’s all!
The love is there inside us – is it necessary to express
it? Yes, because even though it’s there it can grow
weak and wither away if not expressed. But even
when weak, it’s there, and expression can trigger
it. See – you want to give just one kiss to the child,
but the moment you kiss her something springs up,
and you can’t help giving her two, three, four, even
five kisses, until she’s almost smothered in kisses!
This is the nature of love – to want more and more
expression – and are these not rituals?
Daily the father comes back from the office
and performs that ritual. And in the morning the
mother gives the child a bath, dresses her in pretty
clothes and puts flowers in her hair. Usually at such
a young age a child has no dress-consciousness;
whether you dress her in rags or riches she won’t
care, it’s the same for her. But will any mother
think, “Oh, she doesn’t know the difference, so
I’ll dress her in rags”? Will any mother think like

53
Rose Petals

this? Then why do we dress her in pretty clothes?

Again, it is our expression of love. It’s not that the
child needs it: you are the one who wants to see
her dressed in the latest fashions and hairstyles,
and to take photos of her and maintain an album.
Are these not rituals expressing love? In puja they
chant, “Abishekam, vastram samarpayami,” (I offer
bath and garment), and “Naivedyam samarpayami,”
(I dedicate the food offering). So here also, you
bathe the child, dress and feed her. There, at the
end, you say, “Dhyanam karishye,” (I will perform
meditation) and then you sit for a while. Here,
you simply sit and enjoy playing with your child.
And if you miss it, you think, “Oh, today I haven’t
spent time with her! Let me sit five minutes at least,
otherwise she’ll miss me so much!” But in fact, it’s
you who miss her so much, it’s you who make the
time to sit with her. Is it not a ritual?
So these are the ways we express our love. But
they are not the only ways. Sometimes, when the
need is there, a new way is invented, and we keep on
inventing new ways, new expressions, more rituals
to express our love, in ever finer, more beautiful,
more fulfilling ways. Always, the more you express
it, the more it grows and needs to be expressed –
there is no end to it. In fact, “no end” is not a negative
statement because in love, no one wants an end to
it: “Oh! Love should also have a limit!” – No fool
will feel like that. Rather, it should be so unending,
with umpteen expressions and endless experiences.
And this love is triggered by the Satguru, it’s not
our choice, and because that experience gives us
fulfilment, even an iota of fulfilment, we try to

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 Love and Devotion

strengthen and experience it more and more, more

and more. You may call this a spiritual practice, a
ritual, or just a need. To me it is simply the most
natural way of living; it is the art of life.
In this there is no beginning, no end. It’s not that
through suffering, through tapas, through turmoil,
that you reach the cessation of suffering – the
freedom, nirvana, mukti – that you’re looking for.
The practice from the very beginning is the end.
The experience of fulfilment through love is your
goal, and you experience this from the beginning
itself. The path itself is the end – in fact, there is
no end to it. It matters only how much you are
experiencing it at any moment – whether in full,
fuller, fullest, or the most fullest way! This may
be wrong grammatically, but that is how we feel:
every time it is full, at every step it is full. But always
it wants to be fuller, and you want to experience it
more and more. So no suffering, no means, no end,
just that self-consuming love, that experience of
love which is our fulfilment – a fulfilling love. That
is the start, it is the means, and it is the end. Not a
means to an end, but the end itself – that is what I
am saying.
And once you experience that, then this checking
business, of where are we going, what are we doing,
are we getting anything, what is our progress –
all this is not needed. Nothing. No progress, no
progress reports. If at all you get any “progress”,
you progress in more expressions and experiences
of love. And even if you don’t “progress”, you don’t
lose anything because you are already there. That
is the path here. That is Saipatham!

55
Rose Petals

I’ll give you a mundane analogy. If you want to

go to Madras, you go to the bus station and board
the bus. Then, if you are really wise, you simply,
happily go to sleep, because by getting into the
right bus, all your efforts are ended; in effect you
are already at your destination. Why? Because even
though the bus is still in Tiruvannamalai, when it
reaches Madras you will still be in the same bus. So
there is no fretting and fuming, “Oh, have I reached
the right destination? Is this the right bus?”
Here the means is also the end so there is no
question of whether we are wasting our life in
order to get something. Or, if you don’t get it, that
you think, “Oh, all these efforts, all this time has
been wasted! Now we have to retrace our steps and
start all over again!” There is no business with all
these things. You are already there experiencing it,
and trying to experience it more and more. Then
your whole life becomes a part of it, a part of that
experience. Not that we experience it as part of our
life: even one lifetime is not sufficient to experience
it! Is one short life sufficient to experience the bliss
of love?
Then our life has meaning and value. Otherwise,
what meaning do we have for our lives? Come on,
anybody tell me: why are you living? If you are
honest, you will answer, “Because I haven’t died so
far.” Because it’s beyond your choice, because you
can’t help it otherwise. What kind of fate is it, living
this helpless life?
That is how Baba has very beautifully put it. He
said, “Find the guru, otherwise why and for what
have you come? Is it to collect dung cakes?” In India

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 Love and Devotion

they make cakes with cow dung which they use

as fuel, as firewood to cook food, and then when
somebody dies, at the funeral they are cremated
on a pile of dung cakes. If we don’t find that object
of love and make our whole life consumed in our
experience of that love, what happens is that all our
life, all our efforts, every breath we take and every
breath we give out, is like collecting dung cakes for
our funeral. Then all our life is like a preparation for
death, because we can’t ascribe any other meaning
to it. We feel frustrated, we are not fulfilled, we are
not enjoying life. Is there a meaning to it?
When you find your object of love, life is no longer
a preparation for death. Why then are you living?
To experience the Satguru’s love! Then your life has
a meaning and a purpose. Every breath will be an
expression or an experience of love, expression and
experience. When we breathe out we express love,
when we breathe in, we experience love. What you
experience you express, and the more you express,
the more you experience.

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Shirdi, 2006
 Two Paise: Nishtha and Saburi

Radha Bai Deshmukh came to Baba for upadesh,

got none, and resolved upon satyagraha. She started
fasting, which should end only with her death or
with upadesh from Baba, whichever occurred first.
After three days of her fruitless fast I interceded
with Baba on her behalf and requested him to utter
some divine name in her presence. Baba sent for
her and addressed her thus,
“Mother, why do you think of dying and torture
yourself? Take pity on me, your child. I am a
beggar. Look here, my guru was a great saint and
highly merciful. I fatigued myself in trying to serve
him and yet he did not utter any mantra in my ear.
Rose Petals

Instead, he first shaved me clean and then begged

of me, two paise. What he wanted was not metallic
coin – he did not care even for gold – but only
nishtha and saburi. I gave these to him at once and
he was pleased.”
– Sri Sai Baba’s Charters and Sayings, No. 137

GURUJI:
Nishtha is one of the paise Baba asked for as
dakshina. It means paying attention, keeping our
mind on our purpose, asking ourselves, “What
do we want, where are we going, what are we
doing?” Remaining steady and devoted to our
purpose whatever comes, whether palatable or not,
whether happy or unhappy, just persevering in it,
that is nishtha. It is natural to any beggar, in fact – a
real beggar perseveres! If someone doesn’t give, or
chases him away, he won’t go. He’ll keep on asking,
“Sir, one rupee, one rupee,“ but he doesn’t go. He
sticks to his purpose, he’ll keep pursuing it. Learn
nishtha from him.
The other paisa Baba asked for was saburi. Saburi
is happily waiting, not complaining, “Oh, this is too
much, I can’t take it!” or getting disappointed and
easily frustrated, or giving up out of impatience.
Waiting cheerfully, with patience and love, that is
saburi.

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 Two Paise: Nishtha and Saburi

GURUJI:
The story of Siddiq Falke comes in the Sri Sai
Satcharita. He came to Baba after having done the
Hajj pilgrimage and Baba didn’t even allow him to
step into Dwarkamai. He told him he could take
darshan from a distance only and that he should not
enter Dwarkamai at all. And so Falke waited for
nine months in Shirdi.
In fact, it was a shame, wasn’t it? For a Hajji not
to enter a masjid – how he would have felt! Yet this
Hajji Falke waited for nine months and his patience
was so exemplary that at the end he used to dine
with Baba. Very few people were allowed to sit in
Dwarkamai and dine with Baba – only nine or ten –
but Siddiq Falke was chosen. This man who was so
ill-treated before – so-called ill-treatment, of course –
was so much honoured later. What was the reason?
What gave him that? His patience, his saburi. What
was the basis for his saburi? His love. “What’s the
use of my staying in Shirdi? I don’t even get the
chance to enter Dwarkamai!” He never thought
like that. He knew why Baba was making him wait,
and he waited and waited and waited, and he got
what he wanted. That is saburi.

GURUJI:
Nishtha doesn’t mean “faith”. Nishtha should ac-
tually be translated as “unflinching perseverance”.
Why unflinching? Because what “flinches” you
are your likes and dislikes, so unflinching means
na-ishta (no likes). Everybody has their own likes

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and dislikes, their own pulls, their own brand of

preferences; all these are called ishtas in Sanskrit.
That is what is meant by ishta: it is your liking,
something chosen by you. So “na-ishta” means “no-
ishta” – no liking, no choice. So, among all your
ishtas, one ishta (our object of love) should be there
first! Holding onto one ishta amongst all the rest
is nishtha – this is the unflinching devotion Baba
asked for. Love becomes unflinching when the pull
towards the object of love becomes stronger than
our other pulls – then this pull itself gradually pulls
you away from the others, and your love becomes
unflinching and steady; that is nishtha.

DEVOTEE:
Do nishtha and saburi mean that our relationship to
suffering changes, or that we actually experience
suffering less because now it has an underlying
purpose?

GURUJI:
It all depends on how you relate to your reason for
suffering, and to its object. For example, see the
difference between waiting at the airport for your
boss or for your Beloved. Suppose your boss is
coming and you’ve been sent to receive him. You
arrive with a name tag and you’re standing there
when an announcer says, “This flight is delayed two
hours for technical reasons.” Just see, during the
next two hours, how you suffer! You feel anxious

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 Two Paise: Nishtha and Saburi

and stressed by the waiting, you’re impatient for

it to be over. But if your Beloved’s flight is delayed
by two hours, even though you must also wait,
it’s a different kind of suffering, you almost enjoy
it. With your boss, if you don’t wait you will lose
your job; there are longterm consequences to not
staying. Here, with no consequences and nothing
to lose by not waiting, even if the flight is four
hours late, still you will stay. Why? Because the
longer we wait, once the flight comes in and we
glimpse our Beloved, the greater our enjoyment
is! We feel the extra two hours was worth it, no
problem. We love to stand there, we enjoy the
waiting, we enjoy the anticipation of seeing our
Beloved! Just the thought of seeing him makes us
happy! Even the waiting is so thrilling, we enjoy
it! And this actually changes the whole quality of
waiting: it ceases to be waiting in fact. Instead, the
waiting for becomes waiting upon. You know the
difference between these two, hmm? Waiting upon
our Beloved. This is true saburi.

GURUJI:
Na-ishta means no ishta, there’s no “my ishta”,
there’s no “your” choice or liking. Always keeping
your focus, keeping your object in view, always
mindful of why you’ve come – that is nishtha.
Always that attention, that carefulness, that focus
– that is nishtha.

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Rose Petals

GURUJI:
Suppose our Beloved is arriving by train and we
want to be at the station to meet him. We even
arrive one hour before the scheduled time to
ensure we won’t be late. We are looking forward so
much to seeing him that we are waiting happily –
this is saburi. And while waiting, in order to be ready
to receive him, there are several things that need
to be done: we have to enquire about the platform,
check the time of arrival, find out the compartment,
then stand at the right place and be alert. Our
waiting and eagerly looking in the direction of the
expected arrival won’t make the train come sooner.
But when it comes, we are prepared, we are able
to glimpse our Beloved as soon as the train comes
in, and we are ready to receive him. All these
preparations are what sadhana is about – it is the
art of “happily waiting”, the art of readiness and
receptivity.

DEVOTEE:
In the Sri Sai Satcharita it is written that Baba’s guru
first got Baba’s head shaved and then asked him
for two paise. Does that mean that only after all his
thoughts were cleared that he was asked for nishtha
and saburi?

GURUJI:
If everything else goes, then what remains is nishtha
and saburi – total, loving attention, waiting upon
the guru. That is nishtha – saburi.

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 Two Paise: Nishtha and Saburi

DEVOTEE:
That’s what remains?

GURUJI:
That’s what remains. These were the only two paise
that actually remained with Baba – and even these
were to be given as dakshina!

65
Shirdi, 1996
 Concretizing Fulfilment

DEVOTEE:
Guruji, what exactly is it that causes this longing,
this desire inside us for liberation and enlighten-
ment, for seeking Baba? Where does this longing
come from?

GURUJI:
I think I explained this many times. It happens
because you feel you need something, that you
are lacking something, but you don’t know what
it is. And when you see Baba, he personifies, he
epitomizes, he gives you a concrete picture of what
you are aspiring to. You can’t explain it, you can’t
describe it, but something tells you instinctively,
Rose Petals

intuitively, mysteriously, “He is the one!”  He

is the concretization of your abstract sense of
fulfilment. Baba triggers that abstract sense in
you, and because it represents your own sense
of fulfilment, you love him. Just as you love your
own fulfilment, you love Baba. “Your love for
Baba” is another way of saying “your love of your
own abstract idea of fulfilment”. Otherwise, there
is no reason for you to love Baba: why should
you love Baba? Only because in your heart Baba
stands for that!

DEVOTEE:
Guruji, so many people come and prostrate to you
and seek your blessings. How do you feel when
they touch your feet?

GURUJI:
[smiling broadly] I don’t feel anything! I don’t
even think that it is to me they are doing namaskar.
Everyone has their own abstract sense of fulfil-
ment which they are constantly seeking to make
concrete. It is to that sense of fulfilment that
everyone always surrenders. Since it is so abstract
and diffuse, you do not experience it clearly, so
everyone is struggling to realize and concretize it.
For some, their sense of fulfilment is triggered
by a Satguru like Sai Baba, who stands as a concrete
symbol of their abstract ideal. To them a Satguru
is the means to their fulfilment, so as part of their
efforts they seek a Satguru and surrender to him.

68
 Concretizing Fulfilment

Outwardly they seem to have surrendered to the

Satguru, but in reality they have surrendered to
their own sense of fulfilment. If you understand
this process and its mechanism, you will realize
that all these people who are prostrating to me
are not really touching my feet. Actually, they are
trying to touch their own state of fulfilment.
You asked what I feel when people do namaskar.
Yes, if at all I feel anything, I feel that those
namaskars are being offered not to me but to Sai
Baba, because Sai Baba is the concrete image of my
own sense of fulfilment and perfection. Also, most
people need a guru to trigger and help concretize
their sense of fulfilment, so it is their need for a guru
that makes some people see me as one and treat me
as such. For myself, I feel no need for devotees or
disciples, so I do not see them in that light.

DEVOTEE:
Guruji, would you explain what you mean by
“concretization of the abstract”?

GURUJI:
Suppose you know that someone has deposited
one lakh rupees in your bank account, but you don’t
have a cheque book and you can’t withdraw it – do
you think you are rich or poor? You are rich, but
you need a cheque book in order to concretize it, to
actually get hold of the rupees. The fact that there’s
one lakh rupees on deposit is abstract; getting them
in your hand by withdrawal – that is concretization.

69
Rose Petals

GURUJI:
I will say it again: you do not surrender to a guru
or to a Satguru or a Buddha. You always surrender
only to your own sense of fulfilment. Everybody
surrenders, is already surrendered. Many people do
not know to what they have surrendered, because
their idea of what fulfils them is still so abstract, so
unclear, so confusing. But it is the surrender to
your own sense of fulfilment which is expressed,
is enacted, when you touch the feet of a Buddha,
because he stands as a concrete symbol of this
for you. Just as when I look at Sai Baba, he is the
concrete expression of my sense of fulfilment. And
because you can see your abstract ideal in something
concrete, the process of clarifying it becomes
possible; it becomes more earthly, more real. Once
we realize this is actually our own process, then all
our other doubts cease. You only surrender or “give
up” at the feet of your own life, not somebody else’s.
So I am not asking you to “give up” your life – no!
Take it! Make your whole life the path leading to
that final fulfilment! Then everything, every breath
you take, is breathing your longing for fulfilment.

GURUJI:
Everybody – every living creature – is seeking
something, some kind of fulfilment. Everybody.
There is nothing like spiritual seekers and non-

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 Concretizing Fulfilment

spiritual seekers: everyone is seeking something.

Some seek money, some seek fame, some family,
some children, some seek comfort – there are so
many ways to seek. Why do people seek these
things? Because they think that is where their
fulfilment lies. They do not know whether getting
it will actually give them fulfilment. Their sense of
it is still so abstract and unclear that they believe
they will be fulfilled by obtaining these things.
“If I get a good job, I’ll be fulfilled.” “If I have
one billion dollars in a Swiss bank account, yes,
I’ll be fulfilled.” Or, “If I have a beautiful wife, I’ll
be fulfilled.” And she says, “If I have an obedient
husband, I‘ll be fulfilled.” [Guruji laughs] So many
things.
Everybody has their own concepts that they are
trying for. But to some, in spite of getting all these
things – a good job, good wife, house, children,
bank account, some name and fame, living all
these stories, the stories of their lives – they still
experience that something is missing. “Yes, I have
everything. What is lacking? Nothing.” But are
they really fulfilled? Do they have everything?
Are they in such ecstatic contentment that every
second of life they are experiencing that happiness?
Or it can be a kind of a complacency, “Yes, we have
everything, what more to say? What more to think
of?” But to some, this is not enough; they still feel
something is missing.
To those who experience that missing, that
“missing part” is a “mystery” it’s their “missing
story!” [Guruji laughs] It is a mystery, in fact: they
do not know what gives them fulfilment. Then,

71
Rose Petals

for some reason – I don’t want to go into concepts

of why – they come across the concrete form of a
person who they feel, without any reason, will give
them fulfilment, who somehow embodies their
own abstract sense of that.
In my case for instance it was Sai Baba. Just
looking at him I felt satisfied, not that he had given
me anything, not that he’s such a handsome figure
[Guruji laughs], not that he’s a good speaker or
writer. Actually we do not know whether he’s a
scholar, an intellectual, nothing. We haven’t even
heard him speak, but still by looking at him some-
thing happens where we feel a sense of security
and contentment, a happiness, a sense of fulfil-
ment. As though something that was abstract got
concretized: “Ah, this is it! This is the one.” How?
We do not know. We simply feel an attraction and,
mingled with that attraction, a sense of security.
Not that we have got any security from him, not
that he has given a warranty, any guarantee that,
“Don’t worry, I’m going to take care, your troubles
I know; I’m going to do it.” No, he hasn’t said
anything, and we haven’t received anything, but
still we experience a sense of security. “He will
take care, nothing will happen to me.”
What is this feeling? It’s not just a simple joy,
like watching a movie or looking at nature. It is a
carefree joy, a joy coupled with a sense of security.
“Even if something happens to me he’s going to
take care.” Why? We do not know! [Guruji laughs]
Is it because we are so deserving? We do not know.
Or whether he is so anxious to help us? That also
we do not know. But we are so sure that, “Yes, he’s

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 Concretizing Fulfilment

going to help!” that if at all we are in trouble, we

know where to turn. Just the presence, just the
thought of him, just the sight of his form, reassures.
And there is no “why”, no “how”. What is the
basis of this attraction? What is the basis of this
contentment, this fulfilment, this sense of security,
this carefree joy? We do not know of any reasons.
So that is the mystery. Finally, if you want to call
the form which has given you all this, a Satguru,
yes, you can call him a Satguru. Or you can call
him by whatever name you like. But what happens
here is this: the “missing story” in the “mystery” is
the fulfilment that happens through the Satguru. If
you want to add some more concepts and mystify
it some more, okay. Or if you want to know exactly
“What’s going on here?” then this is what’s going
on! [Guruji laughs] Nothing more, nothing less.

73
Shirdi, 2003
 Guruji’s Baba

DEVOTEE:
How did you come to Baba, Guruji?

GURUJI:
It’s not that I “came” to Baba. I always liked looking
at him. And whenever I looked at his photo, it was
almost as if he were alive, as if he was interacting
and responding to me – not that he was appearing
or “giving messages” – not like that! But whenever
I looked at him there was something that was so
dynamic, there was so much rapport between him
and me.
Rose Petals

DEVOTEE:
Would you share your first experience of Baba?

GURUJI:
First, second, third... There is nothing like that! My
experience was that when I looked at him, even
when I was a small boy, somehow I always felt at-
tracted. There was a sense of belonging. That could
be called my first experience.
I didn’t know what Baba was, I didn’t know
his name – nothing! When I was a boy there was
a photo of him in our house and I used to ask
my grandmother who he was. All the gods and
goddesses had crowns and jewels, some looked
human, some had animal faces – there were various
kinds – but he looked different from them. He
looked so human, like any ordinary person. He was
the only one among the whole pantheon that was
like that.
So I used to ask my grandmother, “Who is he?”
She didn’t know anything about Baba, but she
was a teacher and she never said, “I don’t know.”
[Laughter] Elementary school teachers never say “I
don’t know” to children! [Guruji chuckles] They’ll
give an answer to everything, whatever the ques-
tion, even about the relativity theory they’ll say
something! So when I asked, “Who is that Sai
Baba?” she said, “He’s a big Siva bhakta.”
“And what is he doing?”
In the picture, there was a a small horse and
some hills or mountains. I think those paintings
can still be seen, if you look in the old houses.
“He lives in the Himalayas and is doing tapas.”

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 Guruji’s Baba

“On whom is he doing tapas?” – because what

we knew about tapas was only from the movies.
[Guruji laughs] In movies like “Bhukailash”, they
used to do tapas on Siva. So, “On whom is he doing
tapas?”
“On Siva!”
She used to give answers spontaneously. So, a
Siva bhakta living in the Himalayas – that was the
picture I had! That’s all. My grandmother didn’t
know anything about him, not even that he had
lived in Shirdi. I too didn’t know anything about
him, but somehow I had a feeling... Whenever
I entered the shrine in our house, I used to look
at him more and more. Somehow I liked him, he
looked so tangible, so human, someone with whom
I could easily relate. The other figures looked so
strange to me.
That was my first experience – and that was also
my first knowledge of Baba. It was not because
somebody told me about Baba, his greatness, his
mahima, that I got attracted to him. Without any
knowledge about him, I got attracted.
I didn’t read about Baba’s life for a long time
and I went to Shirdi only in 1977. But whenever I
thought of a Satguru or somebody who could help
me, who could do something for me, who could
be so understanding, with love and affection, and
who would respond just like a parent when a small
child asks for something – how the parent gives –
that is how Baba appeared to me.
And I couldn’t think of anything else. I was not
conditioned by any tradition, any devotion, any
gods, goddesses, temples. I was fortunate in not

77
Rose Petals

having all those influences [Guruji chuckles], so

my mind was clean, like a piece of white paper. So
only Baba’s picture was there.

DEVOTEE:
At what point did you recognize Baba as your
Satguru?

GURUJI:
I didn’t “choose” Baba like that. It was not that at a
certain point I felt, “Oh, now Baba is my Satguru,
I will take him!” No! Because I have to use these
words – “my Satguru” – I talk like that, but it’s
not the feeling in my heart. If you ask me, “Who
is your Satguru?” Yes, Baba is my Satguru. That
is the word you are familiar with, so I use it. But
I don’t see it like that, because that sounds rather
formal, as if there is some underlying motive in it,
some relationship in which he wants something
from me and I have to do something, or some
principle, some philosophy, some metaphysics,
all that stuff – but I don’t have that feeling. To me
he’s my caretaker, my parent, my grandfather...
just like that.

GURUJI:
At college I was very closely associated with a
professor, my English lecturer; he was like a guru –
though not a spiritual guru – and I was almost like

78
 Guruji’s Baba

his pet. He didn’t have any devotion or spiritual

tinge at all, but he belonged to the same department
as Bharadwaja Master.1
Master was head of the Department of English. I
started sitting every day with Bharadwaja Master,
as I had been sitting with the English lecturer,
though that had been mostly about English. During
that period, the English lecturer was transferred.
Before he left he saw a picture of Baba in a shop,
and because Bharadwaja Master was a Sai devotee,
he bought it and presented it to him. About a week
or ten days later, Master presented it to me. I had
the picture with me when I went to say goodbye to
the English lecturer.
“Oh, that is the picture I presented to Bharadwaja!
Has he given it to you?” he said.
So it was almost like Baba handing me over to
Master. It was so symbolic to me.
I took the picture home with me. There was
already a small picture of Baba in my house, but
this was a big one. When I got home that night and
wanted to install it, to my amazement, the other
Baba photo had gone! The frame was there, but
there was no Baba picture: the frame was empty!

DEVOTEE:
Why? What happened?

GURUJI:
What happened was – rats! [Guruji laughs] It was
an old photo. A rat had taken the photo from the
1
Guruji is referring to his guru, Master E. Bharadwaja (1938–1989).

79
Rose Petals

frame and eaten it. Later we found some of the

pieces in a corner. It happened on exactly the same
day. In the morning that photo was there, and when
I got back to Kota2 at about 1 or 2 that night and
went to the puja room – shock! (Laughter) Every-
body in the house was shocked. “What happened?
What happened?”

DEVOTEE:
Did you think it was inauspicious?

GURUJI:
Yes, it was definitely inauspicious – that was Baba’s
picture! But Baba was already there – the new big
picture. So I moved all the other pictures to one
side – because like in any normal Hindu household
there were many – and then placed the big Baba
picture there.
I used to sit in that room just looking at Baba. I
did not know any sadhanas. I did not know about
Baba. I hadn’t read his biography. I did not know he
was a Satguru and was going to help me, or that he
had powers. I knew nothing. But when I sat in front
of him, that feeling of being intensely troubled, like
having a severe migraine, lifted. So I needed to sit
more, more, more. The moment that I went away, it
started again. So I used to sit for hours and hours –
not as a sadhana, not that somebody had told me to
do it, but out of need, that is what I am saying, out

2
The small town in Andhra Pradesh where Guruji’s family was living
at the time.

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 Guruji’s Baba

of my own migraine headache. By “migraine head-

ache” I don’t mean a physical headache; I didn’t
have any headaches at all. It was a different matter,
a kind of internal migraine.

DEVOTEE:
Did it happen suddenly for you? That one day you
didn’t have much to do with Baba and the next
day suddenly Baba was the object of your love,
completely, totally? Did it happen like that?

GURUJI:
Something was there which I did not know: love
for something. My mind was struggling for some-
thing. When I saw Baba I realized, “Oh, this is the
one I have been searching for.”

DEVOTEE:
Was that recognition of Baba as your object of love
enough, or was it just the beginning?

GURUJI:
It was the beginning.

DEVOTEE:
The beginning of what, Guruji?

GURUJI:
The beginning of trying to experience it in a more

81
Rose Petals

and more concrete way. For example, when you

need accommodation, you look for a good house
and you go on looking. You have an idea of what
a good house is, you have your own specification,
your own concept, and you try to see each house.
“No, it’s not that, it’s not that, it’s not that.” Then
you see one, “Ah, this is the one! This is the right
one.” But that is not the end, it is the beginning.
You have to see who the owner of the house
is, what the rent is, whether it fits your purse,
and whether the owner will actually give it or
not; there are so many things. So it is only the
beginning. It is the end of something and the
beginning of something else.

DEVOTEE:
Everyone in the world is searching for security of
some kind. For some people it’s in relationship, for
others it’s their family, or money, or whatever. I
know this may sound like an odd question, but in
my heart, I’d like to ask it: what is your security,
Guruji?

GURUJI:
Baba!

DEVOTEE:
You find all your needs met through him, in the
same way that worldly people find their security
in...

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 Guruji’s Baba

GURUJI:
Yes! I don’t feel the lack of anything. Baba gives
me everything. It is more than security, because
security is that which protects what we have, or
protects us from any further danger, but this is
almost a kind of a wish-fulfilling tree. It not only
protects what we have and secures us from further
impending danger, but it also fulfils our wishes.

GURUJI:
What is very important is that sense of belonging,
that experience, that remembrance, “I belong to
Baba and Baba belongs to me!” That is enough. As
long as you remember this, that is real smarana.
Smarana means “remembrance”.

DEVOTEE:
Will the belonging always be there, not dependent
on getting what I ask from Baba?

GURUJI:
If you have that sense of belonging, then even if
Baba doesn’t give, that experience won’t go. For
instance, you have a child. You very much expect
her to pass her school exam, but she doesn’t. Do
you stop loving your child? Why do you still love
her? Because she belongs to you! Whether Baba
gives or not, once you have that experience of
belonging, everything is done. That is enough. It
sounds so simple, but it is not. What we are all

83
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trying to achieve is that: to realize that sense of

belonging, that identity.

GURUJI:
The enquiry, “Who am I?” is a question of one’s
identity; people experience their identity in differ-
ent ways. Some people may experience it as “I am
atman, I am Brahman, I am Ishwara, I am the son
of Sai Baba, I am the son of Arunachala. I belong to
him, he belongs to me.” Ramana Maharshi said he
felt possessed – “avesham” was the word he used.
Because it belongs to you, you want to possess it,
you want to experience it.
That “possessiveness” is not a negative thing;
it is beautiful, in fact, to be possessed by a greater
identity. And that sense of identity is the crux,
it is what transforms, because all our thoughts
and all our emotions are based on it. Once our
identity starts changing and transforming, then
our whole life and all our experiences also start
transforming. That is the root: identity. That is why
Bhagavan said, “Know who you are. Who am I?
Who am I?” First know your identity. Don’t try to
identify yourself, but know your identity. There is
a difference. Unless we lose the present identity we
won’t get the real identity, whatever it is. Bhagavan
didn’t say what it is, but it’s enough if we know our
real identity.

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 Guruji’s Baba

GURUJI:
If you get something, some happiness, you share it
with others. I saw a treasure in Sai Baba. I exper-
ienced something. When you come here, I share my
experience with you. I don’t call anybody, but I don’t
refuse anybody. Why? Because Baba himself said,
“Whoever comes to you, remember that I have sent
them. They have come to you because of the karmic
relations that you have with them.”
So because of past karmic relations we are all
sitting here like this. And I treat you as Baba’s
prasad. I want to respect you. I have to do all that I
can. What I can do? I can only share. That is what I
am doing. It is all an expression of my love towards
Sai Baba.

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Shirdi, 2004
 Expression of Love

GURUJI:
Love is an experience of the presence of fulfilment.
Usually we find that something triggers that
experience and we say that we love what triggers
it. There is always something that we want, but
often it is very abstract and unclear; we do not
know what it is. And our whole life is trying to
make concrete what our abstract sense of fulfil-
ment is, whatever gives us real fulfilment. Some
people in life come across a person – the Satguru
– where that love is triggered. You don’t find any
reason why, but you experience an indescrib-
able sense of security, of trust, of fulfilment,
where all your accumulated so-called likes and
Rose Petals

dislikes simply fade into nothingness. It is not

because those likes and dislikes are fulfilled that it
is like that: something happens. And experienc-
ing, expressing, and expanding that experience is
love.

GURUJI:
You all yearn for love. You give it different names:
freedom, the unconditioned, liberation, mukti,
nirvana, all these things. But in your heart of
hearts what you really crave is to be loved, to be
really loved by somebody. If you experience that
you are really being loved by someone, then love
starts springing, it is triggered. Once it is triggered,
it catches hold of you and swallows you completely,
because that is your abstract sense of fulfilment, and
you’re always seeking some concrete expression of
it. So when it is concretely triggered you give in
to that experience. That triggering is not in your
hands: somebody has to love you. And that person
should be an embodiment of love; he should be
capable of loving you, and of triggering that love in
you. That is the Satguru.

DEVOTEE:
It seems that expressing love usually means to
give. But how can we be more open to receiving
love?
 
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 Expression of Love

GURUJI:
Even though you are expressing your love, you are
receiving it also. What are the expressions? What I
call expressions is to make yourself open more and
more – you call it opening and I call it expression.
When you’re expressing love what happens is,
you receive. While expressing, you receive. Just
think about it. When any expression of love comes
to fruition, you receive love, you experience it. In
fact, it is not a question of receiving – of giving
and taking. That is why I don’t use the expression
“to give love” – because then there is a question
of receiving something. So I only say “express
love”, “express and experience love”. When you
express love, you experience it more. Something
is “pressed” inside, not opening up, not unfolding.
Then you “ex-press” it  – that is expression! That is
what the word means, hmm? 
What I am saying is: you already have love, the
problem is you are not able to express it. Why are
you unable to express it? Because it is not triggered.
Once it’s triggered, expression is needed: the more
you express it, the more you experience it. That is
what we want.

DEVOTEE:
Is there a way to thank Baba?
GURUJI:
Just to experience his love, with a sense of be-
longingness, that itself is the real thanking. Yes, I

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remember someone has said, “No greater gift can

be given than giving one’s attention.” So give your
attention. That is thanking him. Hmm?

DEVOTEE:
Somewhere Sankara said, “Attention is bhakti.”

GURUJI:
Yes, it is bhakti. That is why I called it love. What
is love? Bhakti. What is bhakti? Attention. What is
attention? Jnana.

DEVOTEE:
Guruji, because Baba is not in his body we can’t run
after him, so somehow we have to connect with
him beyond his physical form. So are there ways
to connect with the guru inside also, and not only
running after his physical form?

GURUJI:
Actually, that is what all the people here are doing
in different ways – trying to make their lives in tune
with Baba, making this more and more concrete,
feeling Baba in every walk of life, in every step, in
every breath.

DEVOTEE:
But that’s internal, isn’t it?

GURUJI:
It’s internal. And even the so-called running after

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 Expression of Love

Baba should also be internal, an external expression

of the internal run. If you don’t run inside and
only run outside, it is of no use. That is why Baba
himself said, “If you think Baba is only the form,
you haven’t seen me at all! Even if you stay lifelong
by my side, it is of no use.” That is what he said. The
external run should be an expression of the internal
run; as I said before – an expression of our love.

DEVOTEE:
Guruji, you said calling Baba is something that
comes from the heart; when we love Baba, we
love Baba’s name. And so we want to call him,
and very often that happens spontaneously. But
is there a place for effort when it doesn’t happen
spontaneously?

GURUJI:
Yes. Just now someone said, “Will prayer help?”
Yes, it helps. This is the prayer, you call Baba. You
do it when you really need it, because you can’t
find any other ways, nothing, so what else can you
do? Then you sit and try to call to Baba from your
heart, thousands, millions of times.

DEVOTEE:
But then that’s trying, isn’t it?

GURUJI:
It’s your expression of love. You are expressing

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Rose Petals

it more and more. It’s just what I said – the more

the need, the more the expression, the more the
love. You’ll get it! Then the responsiveness and
receptivity is more. If you simply say, “I love it. I
want that. I’m desperate, I need it.” Nothing. How
are you desperate? If you are really so desperate,
what are you doing in your “desperate” state? Is it
so imperative? So desperate? So needed? If so, then
do it in order to get it. What else will you do? I like
it, that calling, calling, calling. But we don’t do it
because our mind is so tricky that it tries to find
ways to escape that calling. It refuses to make the
calling our calling!
But what I always ask you is to make calling
your calling, your way of life. Sit once in a while,
try to focus on your heart, and call, call, call.
Hours, hours, hours. You will see the result, how
everything turns out, how wonderful. If you want
to call it a technique you can do so – I don’t mind.
Of course, I don’t call it a technique. It should be
an expression of your need, your love. Call in your
heart, call to Baba ardently, earnestly, with all your
heart, backed by all your need. Call! Don’t just
repeat the name. Call!

DEVOTEE:
Guruji, you said calling Baba should be our
spiritual calling, but may I ask what you mean by
calling Baba? Do you mean specifically sitting and
calling Baba, or is there a way of calling Baba in our
ordinary everyday life?

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 Expression of Love

GURUJI:
Actually, the real calling is the expression of our
love, of our emotion. For example, when you are
very hungry you think of food, you long for it.
That is a kind of calling for food. You need not say,
“Bread! Butter!” You need not say it. But the mind
says “Bread!” and it seeks that. Because earlier we
were speaking about nama, I said calling, but it’s
actually seeking, too. That loving, that expression
of love, that longing – there are so many words for
it. And depending upon the context, the word that
is suitable varies – it could be longing, it could be
just an emotion, an expression. It could be just
thinking and experiencing the love and enjoying
it. To me, all these are calling. For example, you
want to have satsang but you haven’t been given a
satsang. So you’re thinking of satsang, “Oh, how
nice it would be to have satsang, we very much
want to have satsang!” That is calling for satsang.
There are so many expressions which can go with
calling – call about, call for, calling on – use all
of them. They are all calling Baba. In English
there are so many expressions which come just
by changing the prepositions. Think about all of
them – they are all calling. Sometimes you call for,
sometimes you call on, sometimes you call about.
Whatever it is.

DEVOTEE:
But there are really limitless possibilities which
could be involved in that kind of calling. Any
expression whatever could be a calling.

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Rose Petals

GURUJI:
Not whatever it is – expression of love! Ah, yes!
Whatever expression of love!

DEVOTEE:
If life is happy, what is there to ask for?

GURUJI:
Some of us have what we need but still we ask.
That is the beauty of it. In that asking, there is
happiness, there is satisfaction.

DEVOTEE:
The beauty of what?

GURUJI:
[Guruji laughs] The beauty of asking, I’m saying.
Not that the only people who ask are those who
don’t have anything – though this may be true
for many. But some people have everything and
still they ask. Why? Simply because asking is an
expression of their love, and receiving is itself an
expression of love. In Baba’s path everything is
so happy that we ask because we are happy. Not
that we are wretched creatures, damned creatures,
sinners. But because we are so happy and we
express our love by asking. That is the beauty in
it. Asking from fulfilment, asking because it is an
expression of our love, that is real Saipatham. Just
as now you put so many questions. It’s not that

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 Expression of Love

you really need the answers, I know. It is just an

expression of your love. And my answers are just
the expression of my love, that’s all. That is asking.
That is why I enjoy it. I love it! [Guruji laughs] Our
whole life should be like that. Our asking is an
expression of our love.
And Baba has given an assurance that there
will be no dearth materially. There will be no
scope for real misery in your life, you’ll get every-
thing. If you want money, Baba will give you
money – amply! If you want a good house, he will
give it. If you want something else, he’ll give. But
still, in spite of having all these things, we ask.
Only for love, for the sake of love. That asking has
a beauty in it, there is an aesthetic experience in it.
That is rasa theory, Rasa Siddhanta. We can know
it simply in our ordinary experience, how we ex-
perience our life, how we ‘taste’ it – the juice, the
rasa of life. Let the whole of life be sappy, be
juicy, and let us savour it! That is rasa anubhuti,
the aesthetic experience of life. That is Saipatham!

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Tenali, 1993
 Namaskar

GURUJI:
Namaskar means “na-ma” or “no-me”, plus “askara”,
or “scope”. So it means no scope for “me” or “mine”.
A state where there is no scope for me or mine is
namaskar. Not, “Did that fellow do namaskar to me?”
Or, “He hasn’t done namaskar to me today.” That
is quite the opposite of namaskar! Do we not pray
that our ego, our sense of me and mine, should
be “crushed under the feet of the Satguru”? So
every time we do namaskar, the emotion and feel-
ing of humility should come, and these should be
strengthened to enliven the experience of namaskar.
That is the ritual purpose behind doing namaskar,
Rose Petals

pada namaskar, or sasthanga namaskar, whatever form

of namaskar you do.

DEVOTEE:
What are the different namaskars you mentioned?

GURUJI:
[Anjali] namaskar is touching the palms together in
front of the heart. Pada namaskar is touching the feet
of a respected or holy person. Sasthanga namaskar is
touching all eight parts of the body to the ground
so no part is elevated; not only the head, but all
parts of the body are flat. As in English they say,
“He fell flat in front of him.” It means nothing
remains [of his pride] because everything has gone.
That is what is wanted, but in a positive way.
And once we want this [humility], once we have
that desire, where is the question of how many
times? Actually, it should be done perpetually,
so one is in perpetual namaskar. That is why the
Muslims, when they do namaz, they put a piece
of cloth on their heads to symbolize their being
under their god [Allah], whose divinity is above
their heads. That is also why Baba wears a turban,
for the same reason.

DEVOTEE:
They put something on the head?

GURUJI:
Yes, some covering to make them feel humble.
That is why, while doing namaz, they cover the

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 Namaskar

head. And a fakir is one who is perpetually doing

namaz, not only four or five times a day, but he is
always in the state of namaz, so he always keeps his
head covered.

DEVOTEE:
All of us eagerly look forward to doing pada
namaskar. We think if only we could get the chance,
we wouldn’t miss that opportunity. But what is the
importance of pada namaskar? How does it help our
devotion? And how frequently is it needed? Could
you please explain this?

GURUJI:
Actually, the meaning behind the custom of bowing
down is to bring the highest part of our body, the
head, to the lowest point. Lowest, that is, to what
level? – to the feet of the Satguru. We do this to
show that before him we are at our lowest, our
most humble, so we bring the highest part of our
body to the lowest part of the Satguru – his feet.
That is how the custom came of placing your head
on his feet, touching them, and as long as you have
the need to put your head at the Satguru’s feet, as
long as that need is there, you should do it as often
as possible. It should be there perpetually, in fact; it
is not how often, it should be there always.
These gestures are only to help make our aware-
ness of this clearer and clearer – that is the purpose
of all rituals. “One time enough!”– No! It is only to

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create that awareness, to make it more and more,

that’s all. That is the only meaning of it. Actually
the real namaskar is the awareness that Baba’s feet
are always on our heads; doing it outwardly is only
a dramatization of that inner experience. All rituals
are like this.

GURUJI:
[referring to a question asked in Telugu] He’s
asking if he has to do namaskar every time he sees
Baba’s photo. The solution to avoid doing namaskar
to Baba’s photo is to do it perpetually, even if you
don’t see Baba’s photo! If you are always doing
namaskar in your heart, there is no need to do it
outwardly. So always be in a perpetual state of
namaskar, then only the outward expression is not
needed. Otherwise you should do it. I do it. There
is nothing wrong in it.
When you see your boss in the office and he
walks towards you, you say, “Namaste, Sir.” Don’t
you say it? We don’t feel ashamed to do that. Only
with Baba do we have a problem!

GURUJI:
Many people who are aspiring to so-called spiritual
realization say, “We have to empty ourselves of all
our thoughts, all our emotions, all the samskaras, all
the vasanas. We should be clean, we should be so-o-o

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 Namaskar

empty!” We have a vague idea of the positive side

of emptiness but we don’t like it; in fact, we can’t
face it. That is the dichotomy, that is the paradox.
So first we should know what emptiness is. That
is why I don’t use the word emptiness, I always
use fulfilment. We have to be filled. With what?
With bliss, with happiness, with contentment –
but there should be space. We are so empty but we
don’t allow anything inside. How? It is just like a
container. You take a container – in the bathroom
you can all experiment [Laughter] – just take a
container and put it upside down in a bucket of
water. Just at the vertical, 90 degrees. Even though
the vessel is empty, not a drop of water will enter.
Why? It is empty; to our thinking, it is empty. But
it is too upright. So then if we tilt it just a little bit,
just one degree, the water will come in. And again
one degree more – more water. One degree more
– more water. After some time there is no need for
you to tilt it more because the water gushes in, and
the rest of it fills itself.
We are like vessels, put topsy-turvy into these
great waters of grace and bliss. That is what Baba
sometimes said, that we are all pots, with our
mouths upside down. When I think of people,
exactly that simile comes to mind – why he said it.
We are all like empty pots, but we are totally upside
down. And if he wants to pour something into us,
no, we don’t allow it, we are too rigid, so nothing can
get in. And what we have to do – the effort we all
have to make – is just to tilt four or five degrees, and
the rest will be taken care of. The whole problem
comes with that four or five degrees only.

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DEVOTEE:
But do we have to do this, Guruji, tilt four or five
degrees? How can we do that?


GURUJI:
If you are not afraid of emptiness and you really
realize that you are a pot upside down, placed
in the ocean of grace, then there is no need to do
anything, it will be taken care of. The problem
is, we are complaining, “We are empty, nothing
is coming inside. We’ve been here so long, just
like this, with great difficulty, in the ocean – still
we are empty.” Are we empty? No, we are full
of gas! [Guruji laughs], but we don’t like the gas.
Just tilt it, then the bubbles will come, blub, blub,
blub! These are your spiritual experiences! [Guruji
laughs] Blub, blub, blub, blub!

DEVOTEE:
But how can we tilt ourselves?

GURUJI:
I told you: if you are aware that you are a vessel,
you will be tilted. The pressure which is trying
to rush in can’t be kept out for a long time. When
you are aware, suddenly the vessel turns, and you
are finished. But you are holding onto your vessel
with effort, and asking, complaining, “Nothing, no
water is getting in.” Holding it like that, how can
the water come in? The water is powerless. After
some time, when you tire of holding it like that, then
the water will come in – when you are powerless

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 Namaskar

to hold yourself upright any more. That’s why we

have to experience that sense of helplessness and
powerlessness, just so we can be tilted a little,
and bend. And that is what happens when you
prostrate before Baba. You are bending, just tilting
your vessel. Remember that. Just one degree more,
then the water of grace pours in. That is namaskar.
Not this bending here, coming and bending before
me. I always wish that you bend your vessel – that
you just tilt it a little bit more!

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 Appendix of Sources

Abbreviations:
s – Satsang (English)
RS – Redaction of Satsang
TS – Translation from Telugu Satsang

Chapter 1 – The Satguru

1 s 46 22 July 1998 Shirdi
2 s 00 compilation 1993-1994 Tiruvannamalai
3 s 00 compilation 1993-1994 Tiruvannamalai
4 s113 26 October 2005 Tiruvannamalai
5 s104 10 March 2005 Tiruvannamalai

Chapter 2 – Focus on the Joy

1 s123 17 August 2007 Tiruvannamalai
2 s109 15 July 2005 Tiruvannamalai
3 s109 15 July 2005 Tiruvannamalai
4 s114 07 December 2005 Tiruvannamalai
5 s 29 19 January 1998 Shirdi
6 s107 23 May 2005 Tiruvannamalai
7 s123 17 August 2007 Tiruvannamalai

Chapter 3 – “My Samadhi Will Answer”

1 s 25 13 January 1998 Shirdi
2 s 37 21 April 1998 Tiruvannamalai
3 s 86 12 December 2003 Chennai
4 s 39 24 April 1998 Tiruvannamalai
5 s 39 24 April 1998 Tiruvannamalai
6 s123 17 August 2007 Tiruvannamalai
7 s123 17 August 2007 Tiruvannamalai

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Rose Petals

Chapter 4 – Living One Life

1 s 99 16 November 2004 Tiruvannamalai
2 RS 31 December 1993 Shirdi
3 s 49 19 February 2001 Chennai
4 s 75 9 June 2003 Chennai
5 s 59 3 March 2002 Chennai
6 s130 28 November 2007 Rishikesh
Chapter 5 – Meditation
1 s118 14 November 2006 Rishikesh
2 RS 19 November 1993 Shirdi
3 RS 19 November 1993 Shirdi
4 s 25 13 January 1998 Shirdi
5 s 69 4 February 2003 Tiruvannamalai
6 s 3 12 March 1997 Shirdi
7 s134 14 December 2009 Rishikesh
8 s 60 21 April 2002 Chennai
9 s118 14 November 2006 Rishikesh
10 s133 23 November 2009 Rishikesh
11 s 69 4 February 2003 Tiruvannamalai
12 s 00 compilation 1993-1994 Tiruvannamalai
13 s 00 compilation 1993-1994 Tiruvannamalai

Chapter 6 – The Unique Mahima of Shirdi Sai Baba

1 s 54 25 December 2001 Chennai
2 s 3 12 March 1997 Shirdi
3 TS 1990 Chennai
4 TS 1990 Shirdi
s 3 12 March 1997 Shirdi
5 s122 30 November 2006 Rishikesh
6 s 19 27 December 1997 Shirdi

Chapter 7 – Love and Devotion

1 s 37 21 April 1998 Tiruvannamalai

106
 Appendix of Sources

Chapter 8 – Nishtha and Saburi

1 Sai Baba’s Charters and Sayings (#137),
by H.H. Narasimhaswami (Mylapore: All India Sai
Samaj, 1998; orig. 1e 1939); pp. 44-45.
2 s117 10 November 2006 Varanasi
3 s 48 6 March 2009 Shirdi
4 s134 14 December 2009 Rishikesh
5 s 97 16 October 2004 Chennai
6 s 117 10 November 2006 Varanasi
7 RS 31 December 1993 Shirdi
8 s 85 8 December 2003 Chennai
Chapter 9 – Concretizing Fulfilment
1 s 97 16 October 2004 Chennai
2 “Sri Babuji” [pamphlet], Saipatham Publications, 1998
3 s 5 30 March 1997 Tiruvannamalai
4 s 17 22 December 1997 Shirdi
s 8 2 April 1997 Tiruvannamalai
5 s131 23 February 2008 Tiruvannamalai

Chapter 10 – Guruji’s Baba

1 s122 30 November 2006 Rishikesh
2 s 99 16 November 2004 Tiruvannamalai
3 s122 30 November 2006 Rishikesh
4 s123 17 August 2007 Tiruvannamalai
5 s 67 18 January 2003 Chennai
6 s 68 1 February 2003 Chennai
7 s 68 1 February 2003 Chennai
8 s 98 11 November 2004 Tiruvannamalai
9 s 3 12 March 1997 Shirdi

Chapter 11 – Expression of Love

1 s 58 14 February 2002 Chennai

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Rose Petals

2 s 44 12 July 1998 Shirdi

3 s 40 5 May 1998 Shirdi
4 s115 30 January 2006 Tiruvannamalai
5 s113 26 October 2005 Tiruvannamalai
6 s118 14 November 2006 Rishikesh
7 s116 23 July 2006 Tiruvannamalai
8 s121 27 November 2006 Uttarkashi

Chapter 12 – Namaskar
1 s 91 12 March 2004 Tiruvannamalai
2 s 91 12 March 2004 Tiruvannamalai
3 s 99 16 November 2004 Tiruvannamalai
4 s 89 7 February 2004 Chennai

108
 Glossary

anjali namaskar Skt. (anjali – ‘hands held hollowed

together’ + namaskar – ‘greeting’);
respectful form of greeting by
joining the palms together in
front of the heart.
arati Skt. “A mode of congregational
worship in which devotees stand
facing the image of a deity or
saint, or a living saint, singing
devotional songs in unison while
a priest or devotee revolves
a lighted oil lamp clockwise
around the object of adoration.
Afterwards the flame of the arati
lamp is offered to devotees by
turn; they pass their hands over
the sacred flame, then quickly
draw them to their eyes and faces
as a gesture of drawing towards
them the auspicious energy
emanating from the sacred
flame.” – Sri Babuji, Arati Sai Baba
(Shirdi, 1996).
Arunachala Skt. (aruna – ‘red, bright, dynamic’
+ achala – ‘still, unmoving,
static’); the holy mountain in
Tiruvannamalai, South India,
sacred to Siva, where legend says
Siva gave darshan as a pillar of
fire; a traditional abode of saints
and sages where Sri Ramana
Maharshi spent the last fifty years
of his life.

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atman Skt. ‘the Self’; the spiritual essence

within the human being (jivatman);
Upanishadic term for the universal
non-localized Self transcendent
to the empirical ego, held by
Vedanta to be identical with
Brahman, the nondual Absolute;
it is the ultimate ground of
consciousness and the principle
of life and sensation.
avadhuta Skt. (lit. ‘cast off’); an enlightened
saint of the highest order
(paramahamsa), who has ‘cast off’
his body-consciousness and lives
aloof from society, having
renounced all wordly attachments
and connections, rejoicing in the
bliss of Brahman.
avesham Skt. ‘pervasion’, ‘possession’;
the infusion of grace or divine
presence into a person, sacred
form, or image; the term used by
Sri Ramana Maharshi to describe
his initial experience of
Self-realization.
Bhagavad Gita Skt. ‘The Lord’s Song’, (abbrev.
‘Gita’); sublime poem of 700 verses
in Book VI of the Mahabharata
(c.5th century BCE), in which Lord
Sri Krishna reveals the nature of
death, rebirth, and Self-realization
to his warrior-disciple, Arjuna,
along with teachings on the
yogas of love, knowledge, work,
and meditation as paths to
salvation. It is Hinduism’s most

110
 Glossary

widely-accepted and respected

text.
Bhagavan Skt. ‘Lord’; appellation of God
(Ishwara), applied (rarely) to a
saint to express highest respect
and devotion; used of Sri Ramana
Maharshi.
bhakta Skt. ‘A devotee, a votary, a lover
of god’.
bhakti Skt. ‘devotion’ (fr. Skt. verb root
‘bhaj’, ‘to share, partake of, adore’);
the practice of devotional theism
or loving devotion to a personal
form of Absolute Being, usually
one’s teacher (Gurudeva), or a form
of God (Ishadevata), as the path to
spiritual realization and release
(moksha).
Bharadwaja Sri Ekkirala Bharadwaja (1938-
Master 1989), college teacher, educator,
author and renowned devotee
of Shirdi Sai Baba, who wrote a
major account of him called Sai
Baba the Master. He taught Guruji
English and became his spiritual
mentor, igniting his love for Baba
and guiding him in his quest for
truth.
Brahman Skt. ‘Ultimate Reality’; Vedic
designation for the nondual
Absolute, whether formless
(nirguna Brahman), or with form
(saguna Brahman); the ultimate
ground of Being (Sat), source of all
existence and experience.

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chai Hindi; ‘tea’; the popular drink

made in India by boiling together
milk, water, dust tea, sugar, and
sometimes ginger and other
spices.
chamatkar Skt. ‘dazzling’; a miracle, or a
miraculous experience.
dakshina Skt. ‘gift, offering’; the traditional
fee given by a student to their
guru at the conclusion of their
studies, or to a priest by a
sacrificer at the conclusion of a
ritual; any offering given in
gratitude by a student or devotee
to a teacher or guru.
darshan Skt. ‘sight, vision’; seeing or being
in the presence of a deity, saint, or
sacred image, in the sense of both
seeing and being seen.
Das Ganu Eminent contemporary devotee
Maharaj of Sri Sai Baba, author of several
aratis to Baba and an early bio-
graphical account, renowned for
his devotional singing (kirtan).
Dwarkamai Skt. ‘many-gated mother’; the
name Baba gave to the mosque
where he lived in Shirdi.
Eknath Title of a major work in Marathi
Bhagawat by Eknath Maharaj (1533-1599);
it is a lucid and scholarly com-
mentary on the Bhagavata Purana,
a sacred Sanskrit text extolling
devotion. Sai Baba sometimes
recommended it to devotees.

112
 Glossary

Eknath Maharaj Famous poet-saint of Maharashtra

(1533-1599), whose writings in
Marathi popularizing the wisdom
of Vedanta, formerly available
only in Sanskrit, uplifted the
common people after the Mogul
invasions, and assisted in the
revival of Marathi literature. He
advocated reform of untouch-
ability and championed the rights
of all people, regardless of caste,
to benefit from India’s rich
spiritual heritage.
fakir Arabic; ‘poor man’; a wandering
mendicant or holy man, usually
Sufi.
Gita Skt. ‘song’; see under ‘Bhagavad
Gita’.
hajj/hajji Arabic; hajj, the pilgrimage to
Mecca; hajji, a person who has
made this pilgrimage.
Ishavasya A brief Upanishad belonging
Upanishad to the Vajasaneyi Samhita of the
White Yajur Veda, and considered
to contain the essence of the
Upanishads. It shows a strong
theistic and devotional tendency,
and teaches the essential unity of
Brahman and the world, of being
and becoming, and that worldly
life and spiritual life are not
incompatible.
ishta/ Skt. ‘chosen’; the deity one
ishtadevata chooses for personal worship.

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Rose Petals

Ishwara Skt. ‘God’; personal form of the

Absolute Being.
japa Skt. repetition of mantras or the
name(s) of God or the Guru.
jnana Skt. experiential knowledge of
absolute truth.
kshetra Skt. ‘place, field’; a holy place, a
sacred field; in philosophy, the
physical body.
lakh Hindi; (fr. Skt. laksha); one hundred
thousand.
leela/lila Skt. ‘play, sport, pastime’; any act
considered to be of divine origin;
a miracle.
mahasamadhi Skt. ‘great absorption’; respectful
term for the death of a saint.
mahima Skt. ‘greatness’, ‘might’, ‘glory’;
one of the eight major powers
(astamasiddhis) of classical yoga;
the power of assuming immense
size.
mandir Skt. ‘temple’.
masjid Arabic; ‘mosque’.
maya Skt. ‘illusion’; the cosmic illusion
veiling the vision of Reality or the
Oneness of creation.
mukti Skt. ‘freed’; liberation from
embodied existence.
murshid Arabic; ‘guide, teacher’; usually in
a Sufi context.
nama Skt. ‘name’; devotional chanting

114
 Glossary

of the name(s) of God or the Guru.

namajapa Skt. ‘devotional chanting’;
repetition of the name(s) of God
or the Guru.
namaskar Skt. ‘greeting’; traditional form
of respectful greeting with the
palms pressed together vertically
before the heart; also the act of
bowing or prostrating before any
object of devotion.
namaste Skt., Hindi; lit. ‘I bow to you’
(fr. namah – ‘bow’ + te – ‘to you’);
common form of greeting and
valediction in modern India,
meaning both ‘hello’ and
‘good-bye’.
namaz Arabic; the act of formal prayer in
Islam, enjoined five times per day
upon Muslims.
Narada Bhakti A medieval Vaishnava work by an
Sutras unknown author in eighty-four
aphorisms (sutras), ascribed to the
Vedic sage Narada, explaining the
essence and path of devotion (Skt.
bhakti).
nishtha Skt. ‘not my choice’ (na – ‘not’
+ ishta – ‘chosen’), commonly
translated as faith; stability of
state or attainment, one of the two
virtues (with saburi) asked of Sai
Baba by his guru.
pada namaskar Skt. ‘foot greeting’; showing
respect and devotion by touching
the feet of a saint or a guru, or

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Rose Petals

their depiction in the form of a

sacred image or idol.
paisa A coin equivalent to one
hundredth of a rupee, now
obsolete; pl. paise.
parayana Skt. devotional reading or study
of a scripture or holy text.
Poondi Swami A legendary saint and adept
(d.1978), renowned for his
unsurpassed spiritual state and
for remaining in an immobile
state (Skt. ajagarabhava) the last
eighteen years of his life, in the
small village of Poondi near
Tiruvannamalai. In 1974, Guruji
stayed in his presence for a month,
which culminated in a profound,
transformative experience.
prasad Skt. ‘grace, favour’; anything given
by a saint or one’s guru; food
that has been offered to a saint or
deity, and is thus considered to be
blessed.
puja Skt. ‘ceremonial worship’;
ritualistic worship of a deity,
saint, or image.
puja room A small purpose-built room for
worship (puja) found in many
houses in India.
Puranas Skt. ‘ancient stories’; a class of
Sanskrit texts written mainly
from the 5th-12th centuries CE but
containing materials preserved
previously for centuries as oral

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 Glossary

traditions. They consist chiefly

of historical and genealogical
records, and teachings on
religious obligations (dharma)
and release from rebirth (moksha),
among many other subjects.
Ramana The celebrated sage (1879-1950)
Maharshi of Mt. Arunachala, in
Tiruvannamalai, Tamil Nadu,
whose rare degree of realization,
saintly life and appearance, and
pristine teaching of Advaita,
distinguished him as among
the greatest saints. At age 16 he
attained Self-realization and was
drawn to the holy hill, where he
stayed for the rest of his life, and
where his ashram and samadhi
are still active and attract seekers
from around the world.
rasa Skt. ‘taste, juice, relish, essence,
nectar’; joy; subtle state of
generalized delight in existence.
rasa anubhuti Skt. ‘experience of rasa’.
rasa siddhanta/ Skt. ‘Rasa System/theory’. A
rasavada theory in Indian aesthetics and
psychology first proposed by
Bharata in his Natya Sastra (Dance
Scripture), about 200 BCE. Applied
first to drama and later to poetry,
it states that the presentation of a
work of art is a precondition for
allowing an audience member to
experience not only a personal
emotional state (bhava) tied to

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specific experiences (anubhutis)

regarding the work presented,
but a generalized state of joyful
aesthetic appreciation (rasa) that
relishes existence itself as a divine
leela. When fully experienced, rasa
was held to be analogous to the
attainment of liberation (moksha),
except that it was of temporary
duration, lasting only as long
as the poem or drama that was
its catalyst and precondition,
whereas moksha is eternal. The
theory was of special interest to
Sri Babuji.
rinanubandha Skt. (rinu – ‘debt’ + bandha –
‘bond’); karmic debt or connection;
prenatal bond or relationship.
saburi Arabic; (fr. sabr or sabur –
‘courageous patience and
fortitude’); equanimity in the
face of difficulties, often termed
“happily waiting” by Guruji. It
is one of the two virtues (with
nishtha) asked of Sai Baba by his
guru.
sadhana Skt. (fr. sadh – ‘to succeed, attain’);
‘dedication to an aim; means to
the goal’; any spiritual practice.
Sai Baba Supreme Satguru and perfect
yogi, the most widely-revered
saint of modern India, who was
Sri Babuji’s adored Satguru and
to whom his whole life was
dedicated. He appeared in Shirdi,
Maharashtra, around the middle

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of the 19th century, and remained

there over fifty years, until the
end of his life (d.1918). No one
knew his antecedents, original
name or religion; his appearance
was that of a Muslim fakir. The
name ‘Sai Baba’ (Holy Father)
was given by a Brahmin priest
when he first arrived in Shirdi.
He lived a life of renunciation
in a dilapidated mosque and
begged for alms. His teachings
transcended sectarian distinctions
of custom, caste and creed,
and his life manifested many
miraculous events that showed
his incomparable spiritual power
and wise, compassionate love for
devotees. This endures even today
as the living experience of the
millions who take refuge in him.
Sainath Skt. ‘Lord Sai, Great King’ (Sai,
Maharaj ‘pure’, ‘holy’ + nath – ‘Lord’
+ maharaj – ‘great king’); a
devotional honorific accorded by
his devotees to Sai Baba.
Saipatham Skt., Telugu; ‘path of Sai’; the
satsang hall in Shirdi and
surrounding area where Guruji’s
samadhi is located; the teachings of
the path of Sai Baba as expressed
and exemplified in his life by
Guruji.
samadhana Skt. ‘equal fixing, one-pointed
concentration’; “a (samadhi) state in
which our quest for fulfilment

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is answered and all our needs are

fulfilled.” (Guruji)
samadhi Skt. ‘trance’; meditative state of ab-
sorptive union; respectful term for
the death of a saint or holy person;
the tomb of a saint or holy person.
Samadhi Mandir The temple in Shirdi where Sai
Baba’s tomb is located.
samskara Skt. ‘groove’; prenatal tendency,
latent impression; psychic traces left
in the mind after any experience or
brought over from previous births.
Sankara The great philosopher, saint, and
poet (788-820 CE) who upheld the
primacy of the Vedic Brahman as
the formless, nondual Absolute
and systematized the teachings
of the Upanishads into the school
of Advaita Vedanta. His commen-
taries on the Upanishads, Brahma
Sutra, and Bhagavad Gita, are the
doctrinal foundation of Advaita,
the oldest school of Vedanta.
sasthanga Skt. (sa – ‘with’ + astha – ‘eight’ +
namaskar anga – ‘limb’); the ‘eight-limbed
greeting’. Most devotional form
of prostration, in which one lies
full length, arms outstretched,
with all eight parts of the body
– forehead, two shoulders, two
arms, torso, and two legs –
touching the ground, like a stick
(danda), thus also danda namaskar.
Skt. ‘True Guru’; a rare, fully
Satguru/ enlightened spiritual Master, a
Sadguru

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sage ordained by his supreme

attainment to guide humanity.
His teachings are truth (satya),
and his life aligned with True
Being (Sat) becomes a vehicle for
manifesting the divine power,
wisdom and love of the ultimate
state.
Satgurudeva Skt. ‘Guru-God’; a devotional
term of address for the Satguru.
satsang Skt. ‘company’ (sang) with the
‘truth’ (sat) or the wise, hence a
gathering for this purpose.
satyagraha Skt. ‘holding’ (graha) to ‘truth’
(satya). The policy of non-violence
in all circumstances, adopted by
Mahatma Gandhi in the Indian
National Movement which led to
India’s political freedom from the
British in 1947.
Shirdi A small town in Maharashtra
which was the abode of Sai Baba,
now a major pilgrimage centre; it
was Guruji’s home from 1989 to
2010.
siddhi Skt. ‘success‘, ‘attainment’;
supranormal (spiritual) power;
the locus classicus is the
Yogasutra of Patanjali (500 BCE),
where eight major powers are
mentioned (astamasiddhi).
Siva bhakta Skt. A devotee of Lord Siva.
Skandashram A small cave with a facade built
on the southeastern slopes of Mt.

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Arunachala in Tiruvannamalai,
where Ramana Maharshi lived
from 1916 to 1922.
sloka Skt. a couplet of Sanskrit verse,
especially one in which each line
contains sixteen syllables.
smarana Skt. ‘remembering’; continuous
remembrance of a divine name
or form as an expression and
practice of devotion.
Sri Sai Skt. ‘True holy story of Sai’; the
Satcharita first comprehensive biography
of Sai Baba, written by his
direct devotee G.R. Dabholkar
(Hemadpant), and sanctioned by
Sai Baba himself; it is considered
the most authoritative source for
Sai Baba’s life and a sacred text by
devotees.
sunya Skt. ‘void, emptiness’.
tapas Skt. ‘heat’; ascetic practices or
penance; one of the observances
(niyamas) of classical yoga.
tirtha/teertham Skt. ‘ford’ or ‘crossing place’; a
holy place where there is a well,
pond, lake, river or sea, the waters
of which are considered to be
holy; any place of pilgrimage,
where one may ‘cross over’ to a
higher life.
Tirumala Most popular temple site in India,
located in Andhra Pradesh, which
receives hundreds of thousands of
pilgrims daily to take darshan

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 Glossary

of the deity, Lord Venkateshwara

(Balaji). With Shirdi and
Tiruvannamalai, it was one of the
three places where Sri Babuji most
liked to stay.
Tiruvannamalai Ancient temple town in Tamil
Nadu, about 185 km from
Chennai, site of the holy
mountain Arunachala and its
great temple to Siva; the home of
Sri Ramana Maharshi from 1896
until his mahasamadhi in 1950, and
where his ashram and samadhi
are still active and visited by
thousands of pilgrims annually
from around the world. Guruji
gave many of his satsangs here.
udi/udhi ‘Ashes’; Sai Baba’s name for the
sacred ash from the fire (dhuni)
that was lit and maintained by
him in his mosque (Dwarkamai),
and that is still burning today. Its
ashes are distributed to devotees
as Baba’s prasad.
upadesh Skt. spiritual advice or instruction
(upadesa) given by a guru.
vardhate Skt. (lit. ‘it grows’, fr. the root vrdh
– ‘grow’). The subtle expansion of
a saint’s presence which occurs
when he transfers in his subtle
body (suksma or linga sarira) to the
subtle dimension after the death
of his physical body.
vasana Skt. (lit. ‘smell’, ‘odour’); latent
tendency, predisposition; the

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subtle impression created in the

mind by enjoyment or the doing
of an action, which remains
unconsciously in the mind and
predisposes it to repeat the joy
or act previously experienced.
It is the cause of rebirth and the
individualized nature of human
existence. In Vedanta, vasanas are
held to be burnt up in the light of
Self-knowledge.
Vedanta Skt. (Veda + anta – ‘end’); the
philosophy of Brahman/Atman
and spiritual freedom (moksha)
revealed in the end-portion of the
Vedas, called Upanishads, and in
the Bhagavad Gita and Brahmasutra.
This triad of sacred scriptures
comprises the ‘triple-canon’ of
Hinduism (prasthana-traya), and
serves as the prime scriptural and
doctrinal basis for all schools of
Vedanta.
Vemana Seventeenth century Telugu
saint, poet, and yogi, whose
unconventional, caste-free
approach to spiritual life and
trenchant social comments were
much appreciated by Guruji.
Ville Parle A suburb of Mumbai.
vipassana Pali (Skt. vipasyana); ‘insight’;
intuitive vision. The classical
system of Theravada Buddhist
meditation based on the
Satipatthana Sutra which gives
insight into the nature of reality.

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