Make Up Your Mind Now

A man was walking in the forest and fell into a well which was covered by an overgrowth of leaves and scrubs. While falling he caught hold of the root of a tree which was growing into the well and so he felt safe. Looking down, he found that there was a crocodile in the well which was waiting for him with open jaws. He felt very afraid. Looking up he found a tiger looking over the side of the well. The tiger was hunting in the night for some food in the forest and saw this man. Then he looked at the root he was hanging from and saw two rats gnawing at it. But there was a beehive on a tree above the well and drop by drop the honey was trickling down into his open mouth. He was very happy, licking the honey.

This is our life. Day and night are the two rats cutting through the creeper of your life. Every day and night that passes cuts into the creeper on which this life is hanging. Below is death: the fear that “I am going to die,” is the crocodile that is waiting tomorrow. Above is the tiger: the fear of what is going to happen today. But we are happy licking the honey: enjoying the pleasure of the senses. This is everyone’s situation — ignoring the trouble that is all around, trapped in the blind well of the mind.

The raft to save you is this body, the decision: “I have to be free during this incarnation somehow.” Make up your mind. You have done very well to be here. Out of six billion people, how many even aspire for freedom? You have to be free right now, because you will not find it elsewhere. You have not yet looked into your own treasure; you have looked elsewhere and suffered. The treasure is within you, the diamond is within you, so don’t beg. Look within and instantly you are rich. No one knows this. With this treasure within us we have still suffered due to the bad habits of wants and hopes of the mind. This is the disease of the mind. Once you have found that you are Atman, that you are the substratum, you are at peace within yourself. Then everything that arises from the Self will be fulfilled. It is not coming from the mind. That which arises from the mind and hope will never satisfy you.