Daily Devotion - Jan 04, 2026 (English)- Renounce worldly desires
You have only one mind. It alone is the doer of every action. It continuously creates desires day and night, because the soul seeks real happiness -that is, the bliss of God. There are a total of five desires: the desire to see, hear, smell, taste, and touch. Therefore, the mind keeps creating these desires through the five senses in an attempt to fulfil its innate longing for ultimate bliss.
There are only two domains - God and Maya. The mind can create desires only in one of these two. There is no third domain for desire.
If the intellect decides that happiness lies in the world, the mind will create worldly desires.
If the intellect decides that there is no happiness in the world and that happiness lies only in God, then the mind will naturally desire God, without being taught by anyone.
At present, however -
i) Your intellect has decided that happiness lies in the world. Whatever decision the intellect makes, the mind must act upon it and generate desires accordingly.
ii) The world is visible, whereas God is beyond the reach of the intellect and is not visible. The mind is attracted to what it can perceive.
iii) Your senses are naturally inclined toward the world because they are made of the five gross elements, and the material world is also made of the same five gross elements. Therefore, both belong to the same category.
Hence, no matter what the Vedas, scriptures, Puranas, and saints tell you about God, the senses cannot grasp Him. The world, however, can be grasped by the senses. That is why the mind so easily creates worldly desires.
Your desire for the true bliss of God will arise only when worldly desires are given up. Worldly desires can be given up only when it becomes firmly established in the intellect that there is no happiness in the world.
To firmly establish this conviction in the intellect -
1) You must align your intellect with the knowledge of the Vedas and scriptures through repeated contemplation of philosophical truths. God created this world for the body. Both the body and the world are made of the five gross elements.
Surapatir brāhmaṁ padaṁ yācate - Even Indra, the king of heaven, desires the position of Brahma because he remains restless, having not attained the true bliss of the soul.
By repeatedly contemplating, "The soul is divine. The happiness of the soul lies not in the world but only in God," the mind will begin to desire God alone.
2) You must also understand through your practical experience that your miserable condition persists despite attaining worldly pleasures thousands of times. Every time you acquire something in the world, you experience momentary happiness. That happiness then diminishes and eventually vanishes, after which the same object becomes a source of sorrow. When you face brickbats from the world, you make desires for God. But when worldly people deceive you again by promising happiness, you again turn toward the world. In a single day, people experience detachment from the world ten times, and the same attachment recurs. Everyone in this world is selfish. When everyone here is a beggar of happiness, how can anyone give happiness to another? No matter how generous a beggar may appear, he can only offer what he has. His bag remains empty; nothing has entered it throughout the day. He will show you that same bag.
You should always understand that until one attains God, no one can desire another's happiness.
Therefore, you must give up worldly desires. They will not disappear on their own. They must be renounced with understanding. Merely talking about renunciation, reading books, or listening to saints does not remove them. The truth must be firmly established in the intellect -
"When I fulfilled my father's self-interest, he showed great affection. Today, his self-interest was not fulfilled, and see how he scolds me."
"Yesterday, I agreed with my wife, and she showed great affection. Today, I did not agree with her, and her mood is off. Everyone is selfish."
By repeatedly reflecting in this way, knowledge becomes firm.
Friendship or enmity, attachment or detachment - all are created by repeated thinking. Similarly, you must repeatedly believe that only God and your Guru are truly yours and that your welfare lies only in them. Thus, through continuous contemplation of philosophical knowledge, you must change the false decision of the intellect that there is happiness in the world. When you realize that your self-interest lies in God and your Guru, your mind will become naturally attached to them without anyone teaching you.
When someone dies, people chant during the funeral rites - Rām nām satya hai
This implies that the world and the body are false. Accept this truth from within. Then worldly attachment will naturally fall away. When worldly desires do not arise at all, the mind will not need to be forced toward God - it will turn to Him naturally, because there is no third place for it to go.
Therefore, Maharaj Ji says -
"O mind! Remove the worldly desires from within and attach yourself to God and your Guru."
When these two pure entities enter the mind, they purify it. Dirt cannot be cleaned with dirty water. The entire world is filled with the three material qualities and sins. Attachment to it will only pollute the mind further. Therefore, withdraw the mind from the world and attach it to God and your Guru.
If the mind does not immediately attach itself to God or the Guru, practice repeatedly. Understand the philosophy, repeatedly withdraw the mind from the world, and attach it to God. By doing this over and over again, the mind will start getting attached to Them. Through repeated practice, the mind gets attached even to inert worldly objects. God, on the other hand, is an ocean of bliss - by repeatedly attaching the mind to Him, you will begin experiencing bliss, and then you will never be able to leave Him. So you must practice in this manner.
Recommended books by Jagadguru Shri Kripalu Ji Maharaj related to this topic:
