What is the important lesson we must remember from the Navaratri celebrations, especially the fire sacrifice? Bhagawan gives us beautiful tips to remember, reflect and transform ourselves.
Every day, when you take food, you are offering eatables to the fire that God has lit in you to digest food. You have to eat in a prayerful mode, in profound gratitude. The Gita says that the fire which cooked the meal is God, the meal is God, the eater is God, the purpose of eating is to carry on the work entrusted by God or which is pleasing to God and that the fruit of that work is, progress towards God. You must perform another yajna too, every day. Pour the egoistic desires and emotions, passions, impulses and acts into the flames of dedication and devotion. In fact, that is real Yajna, of which these are reflections and prompters, guides and prototypes. This yajna is only the concrete symbolic representation of the abstract underlying Truth. Just as a child is taught to pronounce the words – ‘head’, ‘net’, ‘wave’, ‘garland!’ by making it associate the sounds and letterforms with pictures of the objects, through this kshara (temporary) symbol, the Eternal Principle (Akshara tatwa) is brought before consciousness.
– Divine Discourse, Oct 11, 1972.
