Peace, Love and Wisdom: The Key to Happiness

by Dadi Gulzar, Muscat, Oman

Om Shanti. All of you say Om Shanti. Today’s topic refers to something that is necessary for every soul. It is essential because we all consider two things essential in our lives – one is happiness the other is power or strength. With regards to power, we want both power of the body and of the mind. In reality we see that happiness is our own property but it is seen when it is asked whether people are constantly happy or only sometimes people say that happiness does not stay constant. But if happiness is our property that we want to guard disappears under some circumstances, then it is as though circumstances which are guests come and take away our own property. Why does this happen? Why does happiness go away? There are reasons for this.

One, thinking of the past makes happiness disappear, the second is thinking about others and third – waste thoughts that storm the mind and make it weak. It is in the mind that we experience happiness and sorrow. So because of not having the powers to face, to tolerate, to accommodate in the mind, happiness disappears. The method for experiencing happiness is to engage in positive and pure thoughts; we have to make this method ours but as the mind does not have the power to make these our own, it first needs to be filled with power. So, the power that is not there in the mind, where will it come from?

Only the Supreme is known as the ‘almighty’. Therefore, to empower the mind, we have to develop a connection of the mind with the Supreme. And this is what we call meditation – by connecting the mind to the Supreme, the powers that the Supreme has, will come into our mind and thus we can always stay happy.

But to be able to connect with Him, we would need to understand Him. Because it is seen, there are many views on the nature of the Supreme. That is why it is essential to know what He is. He is our Father and we all have just one Father. And since all of us are children of that one Supreme, we become brothers and sisters and it is in this context that we are one family.

Even though we consider God as the Father and remember Him and call him the ocean of peace and bliss, yet we experience sorrow and peacelessness. Wherever we see in the world, we see an atmosphere of peacelessness. What is the reason for this? The main reason is that people have forgotten who and what they are. It is because of forgetting who we are, we become peaceless and unhappy. In reality I am the master of these sense organs, the spiritual being, the soul. Just as the supreme is light, so too the soul is light that stays in the centre of the forehead. The soul does not have any vice within it originally; the vices have entered the mind because of attaching our existence to this physical body and the experiences of this physical existence and it is these that give us sorrow.

So, to change from peacelessness to peace, I need this wisdom – I must understand myself, understand the Supreme, enable the mind to be connected to Him and I will experience His powers and experience happiness,

Today in all four directions there is an atmosphere of tension. We have received this method from the Supreme that whenever you feel tension, we should simply add an ‘a’ before tension, and then it would become ‘Attention. We get into tension when we lose power, the soul becomes weak, and we come under the influence of things that happen around us. So, let there be attention instead – attention to the fact that I am a soul and my Father is the Supreme. Just as when it becomes dark, you press the switch on and the darkness becomes light, similarly with this attention, the sorrow and peacelessness will be dispelled and will become happiness and peace. This attention will serve as a switch of consciousness.

So, now let us connect the mind with the Supreme so that the mind becomes powerful and strong.