Baba says, “If you want to be constantly happy, let your heart belong to the one Father.”

“Manmanabhav!” – this is the blessing or the instruction I receive every day, without fail, from the Father. Manmanabhav literally means “belong only to Me in your mind.” This is also what tapasya means- to belong to the one Father and none other; this is the tapasya of every moment, this is Manmanabhav. It is said of the Father that the Lord is pleased with a honest heart, not a honest head. He is also called the Comforter of Hearts; not the Comforter of Heads. In short, it is the heart that’s important to God; He doesn’t look at how clever I am, but He does care about what’s in my heart.

To belong to the one Father means that I sit Him and only Him in my heart. I can then not give my heart to anyone else. I belong to only the one Father: “I am Baba’s and Baba is mine” Where the heart is, the head follows. Therefore, if I have the Comforter of Hearts in my heart, then He is also in my head, that is, He is automatically in my awareness. It is like a lover and a beloved; because the lover has only the beloved in her heart, he is all she can think about or remember. When the Father is in my awareness, then my thoughts, words and actions also now belong to the Father. Whatever are the Father’s thoughts are now my thoughts, whatever His words, are my words, His task is now my service. This, is belonging to the Father with my heart; there is no more room for ‘I’, for what ‘I think’ or how ‘I feel’. ‘I’ has become ‘Baba’, ‘mine’ has become ‘Yours’.

No matter what the situation is- for instance, sometimes I may have to renounce my name, sometimes my sanskars, sometimes waste thoughts, sometimes physical facilities- but I do whatever it takes to ensure my stage is always elevated. I don’t allow anyone, anything to get between the Father and I. I don’t allow anyone or anything to get in the way of the Father’s task of establishing the new world of heaven. He has told me that in the new world, no one has ill feelings for anyone else, that there is no subservience to facilities, or to people or to sanskars. So if I have to mold myself, I do so with a good attitude because ‘I have to change and inspire others to change’. If my attitude is: ‘why should I be the one to bow down; let them change and then I will change’ or ‘when the situation changes, my stage will improve’, then this is not belonging to the Father. There is still prominence to ‘I’. Belonging to the Father means whatever type of renunciation is required of me, I do it and mold myself. Belonging to the Father means to be a constant co-operative companion to the Father; I don’t make excuses. This is why the step before tapasya is renunciation; without renunciation, there cannot be ‘mine is the one Father and none other.’ Without renunciation and tapasya, there cannot be service.

If I have thoughts of weakness: “what can I do! My nature and sanskars are like that”, then I haven’t fully made myself belong to the Father. Because where the Father is, there cannot be weakness, only power. If while performing a task, I have the feeling that ‘I am doing it’, or ‘my intellect is so good’, ‘this is my idea, my talent’, then that is not belonging to the Father. Instead I experience that the Karavanhaar Father is making me move; it is the Father’s domain and He is getting everything done. I am the instrument. When Baba is in everything, then there is no scope for Maya to come. There can either be the Father or Maya and so to belong to the Father is the easy method to be a conqueror of Maya.

The Father’s heart-throne is so large that souls of the whole world can be seated on it! It is so unlimited “but how many are there who have the courage to sit on it?“, asks the Father. This is because in order to be seated on this heart-throne, I have to make a bargain from the heart. This is why the Father is also called Dilwala (the one who wins everyone’s heart). He gives me His whole heart but then He also demands my whole heart. But often I don’t give Him my whole heart, like He does- in one go; instead, I bargain with Him. Today, I detach my heart from myself and attach it to the Father- but this is just one piece of my heart. Then, tomorrow, I detach my heart from my relations and attach that to the Father- this is a second piece. When I give in pieces, I also receive the Father’s inheritance of peace, and happiness in pieces. By experiencing everything in pieces, I will neither become constantly full nor constantly content. This is why, even now, I sometimes say that I don’t experience as much as I ought to as a Brahmin. Those who strike a bargain in one go belong to the One, they remain constant and stable and claim number one in everything. Those who bargain on the other hand, because of keeping their two feet in two boats instead of one, are constantly in upheaval of one kind or another; they cannot remain in constant happiness. “Therefore“, says Baba, “if you want to make a bargain, do it in just a second. Don’t break your heart into pieces!”

“It is a very inexpensive bargain, is it not?”, He asks. The bargain is to give my heart that has been wandering aimlessly and claim a right to sit comfortably on the heart-throne of the Father, who is the Comforter of Hearts! “Can there be a better bargain?”, He asks and “yet“, He points out, “there isn’t the courage to strike this bargain.” Many desire to make the bargain but when it comes to doing it, I find it hard. Sometimes, I say: “If I had come in the beginning, I would have been able to go ahead!”, “It would have been better if I hadn’t had children.”, “If I didn’t have these situations, I would have gone ahead”, “but“, says Baba, “these complaints are just your weaknesses. External situations can do nothing in front of your original stage. In no way can obstacles obstruct the efforts of souls who are the destroyers of obstacles.” The account of speed, He helps me realize, is not according to the account of time. It isn’t that someone who is unmarried or who came two years ago can go ahead, whereas someone who has children and only came two months ago cannot. Here, He points out, it is a bargain of a second!