SPIRITUAL INSTRUCTIONS

1. It is highly disheartening to see disciples not keeping in constant touch. This is not conducive to spiritual well-being nor spiritual growth. Contact with the Guru is the prerequisite for spiritual living so long as the Guru is in his physical form, that is, alive. Thereafter, one has to resort to powerful imagination of his proximity to oneself. But this apathy to everything the Guru says is either offensive or a dereliction of duty and is the sure sign of future downfall.
2. Sublimate the thoughts in a manner that only the higher vibrations affect it and you are automatically protected from the lower impulses. Also, this effort will help you to receive resonant vibrations from the minds of sages and saints all over. This is the spiritual way.
3. Not to chant seriously is a serious spiritual offence that has reverse repercussions on one's spiritual life and material life as well.
4. Readiness and organised endeavour to fulfil the preceptor's wish along with commitment to the cause/mission are the prime characteristic traits of the truthful soul, the devoted disciple.
5. The Guru's words are inviolable and must be followed with absolute adherence.
6. The miser's money is destroyed. The magnanimous retain wealth.
7. Spiritual power has to be developed by finishing an allotted task within a self-stipulated period of time, and the shortest at that, without entailing undue hurry. Long dragging of work such as slow reading is not conducive to spiritual uplift.Power = Work / Time
8. Please make it a point to study religiously 'The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna' every day. It will strengthen your spiritual life.
9. Life is not to be wasted chasing wild geese. Something worthwhile has to done and it must conduce to the good of both oneself and to society at large. Laziness is to shunned and slow, disciplined work performed on a daily basis must build up the edifice of spiritual life. Creativity must be the foundation of all endeavour and depth of thinking fostered by daily meditation will awaken the creative self. Then all work will be an expression of self-discovery and a joyful repose will permeate one's most laborious hours, for it will be a labour of love and not toil under duress. A mighty concentration on the work at hand with total detachment as to its result once the work is over and the hour past is the formula for success. Work performed in this manner purifies the mind-stuff and paves the way for realisation of the Self, although, work itself cannot help one reach the summit of realisation. Work falls short of the endpoint in this journey of the Spirit, being that much extraneous to the final realisation but being one's best ally in this long and arduous evolution from the near unconscious to the super-conscious. Therefore, we must constantly work for self-preservation and for world-welfare but we must do so in a detached manner with full attention to the means and no attachment to the end. This does not mean we must be irresponsible in action. No, not at all. We have a responsibility to ourselves and also to society and our work must conduce to the welfare of both. As such, only ethically sound activity must be undertaken and that is dharma. In essence it may be said that there may not be an hour when work may be relinquished for that would create a vacuum in one's spiritual pathway and cause one to have a precipitous fall. Hence, work, work, work, and attempt to scale the summit of realisation in this very life.