Some thoughts on Spiritual experiences

Kishore

Following are some thoughts I had in my mind which I wanted to share. 

I have been yearning for grace of God for quite some time and all the experiences I have shared are real events where I felt I received grace of God. It would have been wrong on my part if I don't consider these blessings as true grace of God and discounted them as mere coincidences. These experiences have also led to a lot of change in my spiritual attitude and continue to experience various changes in my thought process.

By treating each and every moment of day as a blessing of God, it helps me to take things as they come. Though we always want things to happen to our convenience, I realize I should maintain my faith in God even when faced with any inconvenience and treat that as a test of God to our faith and character.

Reading through Guruji's teachings, listening to his speech and conversations with him over phone and reading various spiritual articles not only helps me maintain my spiritual attitude but I feel I am making a gradual progress in realizing God.  

My enemies in my spiritual progress

1. Ego: When something good happens there is tendency to take credit for this instead of attributing this to God. I am consciously aware of this tendency and by acknowledging grace of God in various experiences I am able to appreciate the grace and reduce my ego. 

2. Doubt: Retaining faith in God is really tough task. When faced with tough challenges doubt enters the mind and constantly bothers me. Despite the fact that God has taken care of my needs consistently, every time there is a new challenge doubt enters my mind. Will God take care of me this time also? Recollecting experiences is one way I try to overcome the doubt and also constant repetition of God's name, hearing divine songs, reading divine material help me overcome the doubts. This doubt makes me test God. My mind comes up with various tests to God. This fickle mind keeps testing God.  If this trouble is gone without any problem, then I know God is protecting me. 

There are other enemies as well, but I consider the above as important ones.

My efforts to gain God's grace

Daily prayers
Taking name of God as many times as possible during the day
Constantly reminding self that life is smooth due to God's grace. 
Remember that problems in life are a way of testing our faith in God. 
Give up ego, selfishness and be flexible and take every moment of life as it happens.
Be servant of God and trust his guidance and follow his command. 

This is what I wanted to share: my genuine feelings and emotions in my spiritual efforts. 

Any good that comes out of my genuine efforts to praise God and promote his work is his grace and any possible misunderstanding or misinterpretation is due to my personal inability to express God's words properly. 

Jai Sriram, Jai Hanuman

June 2002