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"Remember God's Name,

nothing else matters." Sri Ma

One moment I inhaled

and another moment I exhaled. (1)

My attachment disappeared instantly.

In a moment one step became a mile.

my [ego]-tiger became weak instantly.

I meditated, I remembered,

I searched, and I reflected.

I sacrificed the poison of my animal nature.

With conscious effort, I restrained my ego.

I renounced my home and

remembered God.

God is within -

the devotion is mine.

Little by little I have withered away. (2)

Now I will not let go of your devotion until

the door is unbolted.

I recited the sacred formula

day and night -

I became absorbed in it.

My stone-heart I soaked in it

day and night -

From ashes, I became gold.

(1) The reference here is to breathing exercises to focus the mind and achieve an inward-directed state to open oneself to the higher Self.

(2) In chapter 6 of the Bhagavad Gita, the Lord says: "O Arjuna, know Yoga to be that which they call renunciation; no one verily becomes a Yogi who has not renounced thoughts!" In verse 25, the means to achieve this is given: "Little by little let him attain to quietude by the intellect held firmly; having made the mind establish itself in the Self, let him not think of anything." To reinforce this truth, the Buddha declared the highest virtue to be "Patient Perseverance"!

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from Lalla to Nuruddin translated from the Kashmiri by Ranjit Hoskote

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