24x7 Spirituality
Once, a group of students were raising funds for some community work and they happened to knock on a particular door in the neighbourhood. An eighty-eight-yearold lady opened the door. She asked them in and they explained the work that they were doing for the community. They told her the different options that they had through which she could contribute to the work that they were doing. And then they said “You can make a pledge for the next three years; you don’t have to pay it all up front.” She said “At my age, I don’t even buy unripe bananas. Making a pledge for three years! No way.”
A person on the spiritual path should be like this – you don’t even have time to buy unripe bananas; you have got to be in a hurry. Once a little laxity comes, it will take lifetimes. If you are in a hurry, it is very quick.
The problem with people is, they are always aspiring for something to happen to their life. They are bored with what is there. But if anything new happens, they have a fear about it. This is like wanting to drive your car with the hand brake on – it does not work like that. If you want to drive, you must take off the brake. If you don’t want to drive, you should not get into the car at all.
It needs a little steady application, where it is a continuous steady rise, so that in a couple of months or a year, you should find a significant difference in the way you are. You must keep it on steadily. Twenty-four hours your spirituality should be on. What does spirituality being “ON” mean? “Does it mean I can’t go to the office? I can’t be with the family?” You must make everything into a spiritual process. Talking to somebody, working in the office, every single activity, every breath that you take if you make it into a spiritual process, you will see within a few months, you will be in a completely different space where your presence will be cherished in the world – not just by human beings, every other being will respond. Even animals and plants will respond to you in a wonderful way. You just have to keep it going. If it is off and on, off and on, it will take lifetimes.