In plain words
So first take off tamo-guṇa. Then take off rajo-guṇa. After that take off the sāttvika too. Only then will the principle of your Ātma be visible to you. These are only dresses you have put on! Take off what you have put on, that is all! What is, is seen just as it is. To see it, you need make no new effort. You have fostered the nature of your guṇas. Tear up the guṇas you have fostered. See clearly the heart you have kept. For this too God's grace is needed. To win this grace of God, we must do sādhanas. Only when negative and positive both come together can we put them to many uses. Without doing so, however many holy places you go round, however many sādhanas you do, however many great souls you see, you cannot enjoy even a little Ānanda. You think, ‘Alas! I have been to Puttaparthi ten times and come back, and my troubles have not ended!’ How will they end? Do troubles end just by coming to Puttaparthi? If you think, ‘I went to Tirupati and paid all my vows, and my sorrows have not ended’, how will they end? Today's Bhakti and prapatti are all filled with petty prayers. What you must ask for is God alone. He Himself will grant you everything. If you ask for things, saying ‘I want this, I want that’, the Paramātma will not be yours. If we hold the gold we need in our hand, we can have all kinds of ornaments made. We must make the effort that is fit for God's grace. God alone is what we must ask for. The reason is that you too are God! Betraying God is betraying yourself! Only when you recognise this truth will consciousness come to you. Keeping our petty notions and petty sorrows in view, we should never try in the least to push away the infinite, sacred, divine Godhood. The studies we read and the studies we learn are only for recognising the principle of the Ātma.