Suffering

"Pleasure and pain are of your own making.  They are not given by God.  You are the cause of your suffering, none else.  Understand this truth.  From the spiritual point of view, pleasure, pain and worldly relationships are illusory.  They are not real.  

Right from dawn to dusk, you lead a life full of delusion.  Having been born as a human being, you should try to gain the experience of truth.  The physical body grows for a certain period and later on becomes weak and decrepit.  Birth and growth are related to the body which is unreal.  But man considers body to be real and thereby suffers.  

With open eyes, you see many people.  But when you close your eyes, you cannot see anybody.  From where do so many people come when you open your eyes?  Where do they go when you close your eyes?  You do not know.  In fact you do not know who you really are.  That is why you suffer.  Once you realise that you are not the body and nothing in this world belongs to you, you will not suffer.  Everything in this world is of your own making.  Nothing is real.

You are the embodiment of love.  Love is with you and in you always.  Bereft of love, man cannot exist.  Love is life.  Love is the light that dispels the darkness of ignorance.  Once you have the light of love, you will be able to overcome illusion and visualise the latent reality.  One who does not cultivate love will be born again and again."

~ Sri Sathya Sai Baba ~

(Divine Discourse - 25.12.2003)