Disciple: Mother, why is it that the mind does not become steady? When I try to think of God, I find the mind drawn towards other objects.

Mother: It is wrong if the mind is drawn towards secular objects. By ‘secular objects’ is meant money, family, etc. But it is natural to think of the work in which one is engaged. If meditation is not possible, do Japa. Realization will come through Japa. If the meditative mood comes, well and good, but by no means do it by force.

Disciple: Is it of any use to be merely repeating His Name without intense devotion?

Mother: Whether you jump into water or are pushed into it, your cloth will get drenched. Is it not so? Meditate every day, as your mind is yet immature. Constant meditation will make the mind one-pointed.

Discriminate always between the real and the unreal. Whenever you find your mind drawn to any object, think of its transitoriness (short life), and thus try to withdraw the mind back to the thought of God. A man was angling. A bridal party was going along the road with music. But the angler’s eye remained fixed on the float. The mind of a spiritual aspirant should be steadfast like that.

Disciple: Suppose I can’t do Japa of the Mantra of my chosen Deity?

Mother: What do you mean? You won’t do Japa of your Mantra? What a suggestion! If you don’t do the Japa, you lose; that affects me not in the least!

The mind keeps well when engaged in work. And yet Japa, meditation, prayer also are specially needed. You must at least sit down once in the morning and again in the evening. That acts as a rudder to a boat. When one sits in meditation in the evening, one gets a chance to think of what one has done – good or bad – during the whole day. Next one should compare the states of one’s mind in the preceding day and the present. Unless you meditate in the mornings and evenings along with work, how can you know what you are actually doing?

Do you know the significance of Japa and other spiritual practices? By these, the power of the sense organs is subdued.

Do not give up Japa even if the mind is unwilling and unsteady. You must go on with the repetition. And you will find that the mind is getting gradually steadier-like a flame in a windless corner. Any movement in the air disturbs the steady burning of the flame; even so the presence of any thought or desire makes the mind unsteady. The Mantra must be correctly repeated. An incorrect utterance delays progress.

“Repeating the Name of God a fixed number of times, telling the rosary or counting on fingers, is calculated to direct the mind to God. The natural tendency of the mind is to run this way and that way. Through these means it is attracted to God. While repeating the name of God, if one sees His form and becomes absorbed in Him, one’s Japa stops. One gets everything when one succeeds in meditation.”

– Holy Mother Sarada Ma