Think of God and chant His Name under all circumstances.

Human life can be compared to a four-storeyed mansion. Brahmacharya, Grihastha, Vanaprastha and Sanyasa (celibacy, householdership, recluse and renunciant) are the four stages of human life. Brahmacharya is the foundation; if the foundation is strong, the other three stages will be automatically taken care of. But modern youth are ruining three-fourths of their lives because they do not have a strong foundation. When elders advise them to sit for prayers for at least five minutes, they say they have no time, but they have all the time in the world to wallow in bad qualities and habits. Youth in particular should make every effort to build a strong foundation of Brahmacharya. Merely remaining a bachelor is not Brahmacharya. Constant contemplation on Brahman is true Brahmacharya. Think of God and chant His Name under all circumstances. Lead a life of purity. Dedicate your life to the principle of love. This ensures the safety of the mansion of your life.

Bagavan Sri Sri Sri Sathya Sai Baba

Desire destroys devotion, anger destroys wisdom, greed destroys work – hence these bad qualities must be corrected.

Today people are not making proper use of their mind (mati), effort  (gati),  position 
(sthiti) and wealth (sampatti)? As a result, they are losing the sacred energy that God has blessed them with. Not merely this, they are subjected to misery and grief because of their evil traits like kama, krodha and lobha (desire, anger and greed). They have absolutely no control over their desires. When one desire is fulfilled, people crave for another. Anger is another evil trait which ruins people. Hatred is more dangerous than anger. It gives rise to many evil qualities which obstruct your experience of Divinity. Humans are supposed to live for a hundred years, but one’s life-span is cut short by these evil qualities. When these evil traits are totally subdued, one can enjoy a long and happy life. One will not lose one’s life even if he or she were to meet with a serious accident.

Bagavan Sri Sri Sri Sathya Sai Baba

Divine Bank

Banks have safe deposit vaults, where customers can keep their valuables, jewels, legal documents and other precious metals like silver and gold which attract thieves; people can then be free from anxiety and sleep in peace. Do you know that your Divine Bank also has a safe deposit vault? In it, you can surrender your jewels of intelligence, cleverness, capacity to serve and the gem that you most value, namely, your ‘ego’ to the care of God! Then, you can be free and happy. The Divine Banker invites: “Surrender to Me alone” (Mam ekam sharanam vraja). Then, He assures you that you need not grieve at all (Ma suchah). The wealth (dhanam) acceptable in the Divine Bank comes only to those who struggle to be virtuous and detached, humble and holy. The virtues (punyam) you do, the purity you achieve, and the love that you manifest - these are the precious things the Lord gladly accepts as deposits.

Bagavan Sri Sri Sri Sathy Sai Baba