It is often said that we do not choose our destiny, it is our destiny that chooses us. We may plan anything in life but more often than not we have to do things that we have not planned. Learned have often said that life gives us freedom to the extent provided to a cow tied to a pole. "The freedom to the cow is the extent of rope tied to it".

Our karma guides us to the place where we belong. Sometimes it can also be because of some debt of previous birth. These debts forms Sanskara around us that makes us choose some particular direction in life.

This is the reason why a person has to adopt some change and adjustments in life when his time comes. This was the exact reason why Bhakt Prahlad remained a devotee of Lord Vishnu even when he was born in the house of demon. Even his birth couldn’t change his Sanskara of previous birth and he remained a devotee of Lord Vishnu even though his father was against it.

My experience in spirituality is that no one knows about his Guru until and unless the Guru pulls us in the direction of spirituality. The pull of Guru is something that cannot be controlled. Sai himself said “Let his devotee be anywhere he will be drawn to Shirdi as a sparrow whose legs are tied”. But, when Sadguru pulls then he is the only custodian of our soul. Hence, thereafter whatever progress that come in our life is the grace of Sadguru himself.

Without Sadguru the plight of a soul can be compared with the plight of a child amidst dense forest without a guide. Sadguru is the guide who has himself travelled each and every step in spirituality and he is aware of pitfalls in the way. By simply having faith in Sadguru a person can not only make his journey safe but can also achieve success in his endeavor.

Unlike other privileged devotee I was not born into Sai faith. Our family was rich in spirituality as a traditional Brahmin family. My Grand father was a priest in Lord Shiva temple. Our family had rich tradition of spirituality. But, by then faith of Sai Baba of Shirdi had not developed in our home town.

Sai Baba came to my life for the first time when I was a child from a movie filmed by Mr. Manoj Kumar (a veteran actor and producer). It was strange for a child to sit through the entire movie leaving his friends and game of cricket. The feeling was that I knew him. I relate to him, but the child did not have the maturity to understand anything much about him.

When I went to a Sai temple I felt that this is not the Sai that I knew. At times I felt that people are not able to understand him yet. Somewhere, I always had a feeling that I am aware of Sai and this connection is deeply linked with my previous birth.

In the mean time the pull of divine made me join Bhartiya Vidya Bhawan for a course in astrology. There I had a chance to learn astrology from a very distinguished and able faculty of good astrologers headed by Mr. K. N. Rao.

However, the thirst of Knowledge was not over even after getting the degree of Jyotish Acharya and even after being one of the favorite student of astrology in my batch. Somewhere I had a feeling that I am not doing justice to astrology as pointing out problems is not enough. I felt that my work is done only if I am able to bring my consulters out of problems, by bringing faith and grace of God in them.

This thirst of knowledge changed the basic direction of life and I started getting deeply involved in spiritual practices like control over mind, by Mantra, Sadhana and Tap.

However, my life changed for good only after revered Guruji C. B. Sathpathyji came in my life. He transformed the yogi in me into a Karma yogi (servant of Sai) and made me realize that the only love and connection in this world for me is Sai Baba. With his grace I was able to make a platform for myself from where I was able to help thousands of people in the world by guiding them to their spiritual reality.

 (Written by: Anand Sagar Pathak)