You have to think yourself to receive the food of marifat, or God-realization. This comes through thinking. If you don’t activate your thinking, you are just like an animal. An animal also has everything, but it doesn’t think. Take a fish, for example. If a fish is removed from water, it will become restless. But the fish doesn’t know why it is restless. When you put it back in water, it would become very active in the sea. If you leave it outside the water, it would only become restless. It is neither conscious of being inside the water nor conscious of being outside the water. A fish has gills, which are different from human lungs. It doesn’t take in oxygen directly from the air. The fish has respiration just as we do, but its system is different from ours. A fish cannot take in oxygen directly from the air. A fish takes in oxygen from water. It extracts oxygen directly from water. A fish does what we cannot do. When a fish is inside water, it receives oxygen. When it is outside water, it doesn’t receive oxygen. But no fish is aware of this fact. It is a human being who discovers why a fish is active inside water but restless outside of water. Our case is different. We take in oxygen from the air. We cannot take in oxygen from water. Thinking about these realities leads to God-realization.

The Sufis think God-realization means seeing God. They engage in meditation, in which they have certain glimpses. They believe that they are seeing God. This is nothing. This is not marifat, or God-realization. You cannot see God. You have to discover God at the level of your thinking. To close your eyes in meditation and try to see glimpses of God is absurd. You will discover God by thinking about His creation. This happens at the level of thinking. The more you think, the more you will understand. When you discover God, then you will develop all qualities. You will begin to worship, you will remember God much, you will increase in morality and your personality will be moulded along divine lines. Fear of God and thankfulness to God are both linked to marifat, and marifat comes with thinking. If there is thinking, there is marifat. When there is marifat, your personality will have everything that is desirable.