Sathya Sai Baba The World-Avatar Teaching and Revelations

moving about, lack of sufficient sleep at night, these too cause sleepiness
and drowsiness. (...)
Restlessness
The mind seeks to run after external objects and so constant effort is
needed to turn it inwards, away from the attractions of sensory impressions.
Discriminate and understand that these are evanescent, temporary,
transformable, liable to decay and unreal, not the Truth. Convince
yourselves that what are sought after as pleasurable and
avoided as painful are only the fleeting products of sensory contacts;
train yourselves in this way to avoid the distractions of the external
world and dive deep into meditation, through rigorous exercise of the
intellect inquiry. (...)
Entanglement
The mind is drawn with immense force to all the unconscious impulses
and instincts of passion and attachment towards the external world
and its multitudinous attractions. It experiences untold misery and
might even get lost in its depths. This is the stage called decline. (...)
Highest subject-object contact: When restlessness and entanglement
are overcome, one attains the bliss of the highest subject-object contact.
This stage is what is called: “The enjoyment of bliss”. Even this is
not the highest or the supreme bliss, which one does not attain or acquire,
but simply is, becomes aware of. The sweetness of the subjectobject
experience is a temptation one has to avoid, for it is only the
second best. It is enough joy to act as a handicap! (...)
When the sun rises, darkness as well as the troubles arising from it disappear.
Similarly, for those who have realized the Divine self, the Atman,
there is no longer any bondage, nor the sorrow arising from
bondage. Delusion comes only to those who forget their bearings:
Egoism is the greatest factor in making people forget their very basic
truth. Once egoism enters man, he slips from the ideal and precipitates
from the top of the stairs in quick falls from step to step, down to the
very bottom floor. Egoism breeds schisms, hatreds and attachments.
Through attachment and affection, and even envy and hatred, one
plunges into activity and gets immersed in the world. This leads to embodiment
in the physical frame and further egoism. In order to become
free from the twin pulls of pleasure and pain, one must rid oneself of
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