In plain words
We must develop the disposition to offer such a pure heart to the Paramātma. How should we offer the coconut to the Paramātma? As long as the fibre is on top, however many ways we try, it will not break. We must strip off that fibre, that is, the tamoguṇa. We must root out foolishness. We must crack the shell called rajoguṇa too. Then the sacred kernel called sāttvikatva becomes an offering to the Paramātma. We must develop the feeling that we should make the offering to the Paramātma only when the heart is pure; to think, ‘I wished for something and broke a coconut; if it is spoilt, that is a bad sign, if it is good, a good sign,’ is foolishness. At the very time of taking the coconut we must look at whether it is good or bad and choose it.
Some others go into the shrine and sit down, thinking it is enough just to sit there. There is no benefit in merely going and sitting, thinking it a holy place. When we sit in the temple, the thought of God must sit in us! Sitting in the temple, we must seat God within ourselves. ‘Deho devālaya prokto jīvo devas sanātanaḥ!’ If the body alone sits in the temple and the mind is left behind in the bazaar, is that being in a holy place?
Now the third. We keep reciting mantras, and grandly. But only when we recite a mantra knowing at least a little of its meaning does the mantra have its worth. A mantra whose meaning is not known, a heart without purity, a spoilt coconut: these three have one and the same result. So in every small act too we must recognise the steadiness, the purity and the holiness in it, and act accordingly. However many hardships, losses and sorrows come, our feeling must not waver from God even a little. Even when lightning flashes fit to burst the ears, when terrible clouds gather, when the rain pours down in torrents, the cātaka bird keeps longing for those raindrops alone.