Making God into stone - that is the effort being made today! How can such effort lead to Truth, when the real task is to see the stone as God? First, the Form of the Godhead has to be meditated upon and imprinted on the consciousness; then, that Form has to be conceived within the stone and the stone forgotten in the process, until the stone is transformed into God. In the same way, you have to imprint on your consciousness the basic Dharma, the Fundamental Fact of Atma as the only Entity; and, then, filled with that Faith and Vision, you have to deal with the manifold world of objects, its attractions and impingements. The Ideal can be realised only thus. If this is done, there is no danger of the Authentic Meaning getting diluted, or Atmadharma losing its luster.

What happens when a stone is worshipped as God? The Unlimited, the Ever-present, the All-pervading-immanent Entity, the Absolute, is visualised in the Particular, in the Concrete. Similarly, Dharma, which is Universal, Equal and Free, can be spotted and tested in a single concrete act. Do not be misled by the idea that this is not possible. Are not many things difficult accomplished by you, things that only increase your anxiety and fear? If man is wise, can he not take up instead things that are more worthwhile, which give him peace of mind?

To be free is your birthright, not to be bound. It is only when you guide your steps along the Path illumined by the Universal Unbound Dharma that you are really free; if you stray away from the light, you get bound and you are caught. Some might raise a doubt; how Dharma which sets limits on thoughts and words, which regulates and controls, can make a person free. "Freedom" is the name that you give to a certain type of bondage; genuine freedom is got only when delusion is absent, when there is no identification with the body and the senses, no servitude to the objective world. Persons who have escaped from this servitude and achieved freedom in the genuine sense are very few in number. Bondage lies in every act done with the consciousness of the body as the Self, for, man is then the plaything of the senses. Only those who have escaped this fate are free; that "freedom" is the ideal stage to which Dharma leads. With that stage constantly in mind, if one engages in the activity of living, he can become liberated, a Mukthapurusha.

It is only because you bind yourself that you become bound and stray away from the Dharmic path. It is always so; no other person can bind you; you do it yourself. If faith in God's Omnipresence is deep-rooted, then, you would be aware that He is your self and that you can never be bound! For that faith to grow, you must grasp Atmananda firmly. The reality of the Atma is the bedrock, the Jnana that is incontrovertible, the Nischithajnana. Devoid of that foundation, one becomes the target of doubt, despair and delusion. The maid of Dharma will not wed such.