Try to evaluate objects as they really are. To lead a proper
life one has to assign a limited value to objects. Certain objects are
indispensable for the maintenance of life. For that purpose and to that end
they should be utilized; but let them not assume an undue prominence. For
instead of serving as the proper sustenance, they may become the veritable
tyrants, sapping life of all true contentment and satisfaction.
Your happiness may become mortgaged to these objects. No
longer of limited utility, they seem to be of utmost importance. Therefore,
they come to have a stranglehold upon you and tend to dominate and enslave you.
A proper understanding and a right evaluation of objects as they are and for
what they are worth, is of prime concern.
“Thus far and no further”—you must say, when they try to
invade the interior kingdom of your life.
words
Swami Chidananda Saraswati (1916 – 2008) was the president
of the Divine Life Society in Rishikesh – associated with the Swami Sivananda
Ashram
