Around the age of 13, on a fine night, while my parents were in deep sleep, I happened to hear about and see Sai Baba for the first time, on TV. However, the program was concentrating more on criticising Him rather than talking about His divinity! That was the first time I came to know of His existence and the one spiritual issue that would become a vital topic of interest for me:

 

How can a man be God? In fact, I have found out since then that man is God by his very Being, but man is also blessed with the divine possibility to realise this truth and become God, that is, through the process of Becoming.

​

Some years later, in 2010, when I was 19, while passing through a period of utter depression and a strong desire to kill myself; one day I visited the parents of one of our old neighbours. The mother was a healer, and the house was decorated with the pictures and books of Sai Baba. That definitely reawakened my curiosity and I started to examine Him, who He was, and there was this strange feeling or an energy that I had never felt until then.

​

Thereafter, I learned that there was a Selfless Seva Trust in Istanbul, and they, as part of the Turkish Sai Movement founded by the late Kaya Günata, were doing all sorts of Seva activities, study circles and singing Bhajans. She invited me to the Trust’s premises where the activities were performed regularly. From that day onwards, thanks to Swami’s grace, I am here, having become a member of the Trust, trying to do my best to be an able and available instrument for His divine mission.

​

While attending the study circles, Bhajans, and so on, I was also reading and studying spiritual books, but the whole idea of the entire transition of my consciousness to a more spiritual one was not yet clear to me, since I was still dealing with many psychological issues within myself. 

​

In 2013, Kaya Günata, to whom I owe almost everything, summoned me to join him in the computer and media related activity. This was being carried out in a room converted to a studio, right within the Sai Clinic which is an apartment of the Trust building. Here, he was being an instrument to Swami in spiritual healing for more than 20 years. Every Saturday, I would allocate my whole day for the activity carried out there. He would be working alone in his own apartment, which was only one floor above the Clinic, and I would be working by myself in the studio, which was more like a ‘studio clinic’ for me; because on the one hand, I was making deep research upon Swami and His mission, as we were preparing a visual documentary for the people in Turkey, and on the other hand, I was directly getting silent spiritual healing right within the Sai Clinic. That changed my life entirely! 

​

Through these sessions of uplifting studies – reading spiritual books and having exquisite intimate moments with our beloved Kaya, who had a priceless treasure of experience and spiritual wisdom – I was a completely transformed person when compared to the previous version of myself. Those years not only cured the wounds in me but they also made the Divine emerge from within me. Since then, a number of us, as a dedicated core team, are working for Swami’s mission in Turkey.

​

In fact, I did not have the chance to see Swami in His physical form and I was thinking that I would never have a chance to see Him. However, one day in 2016, brother Kaya informed us about Swami’s mission in the Subtle Form. I immediately felt the urge to go to India with him and observe what we were told. 

​

When we were finally at the Premamrutam Hall in Muddenahalli, I could only experience fast heart-beats and a deep excitement while Swami was gliding in His Subtle Form. I could not see Him with my physical eyes, yes, but I could feel Him with my inner eye; there was this feeling of ‘Swami is here, present in me’, and I could also feel it in the way Brother Madhusudan’s being was totally immersed in Him. It was such a feeling in my heart, filling the gap of all the previous years and telling me that this is really Swami Himself. There was a profound change in me as I felt Swami very close to me. I felt totally related to Him, totally in Him. 

​

However, I had to leave Muddenahalli a few days earlier and that made me a bit sad. But Swami was kind enough to enact a small drama on the last night of my stay. After the first Darshan in the Subtle Form, a brother kindly took me to the juncture going up to Sai Anandam and made me stand at a point where I could see Swami passing in His car. It was raining, too. Swami came in His car and as He was passing the road up to Sai Anandam, for one moment, our eyes met and He made a gesture with His hand which was only peculiar to Swami, saying a hearty good bye till our next meeting. That eye contact aroused the divine in me, changed something within me. Swami was the same Swami with only a single difference that He was in the Subtle Form; but I was not the same at all levels of existence! 

​

Soon after Swami’s Divine Visit to Turkey in 2017, thanks to His grace, we, as the core group in Turkey, were blessed with the divine task of working on the translation and publishing of the Sri Sathya Sai Uvacha books in Turkish, so I have been having a lot of chances to read and ponder upon the subtle messages of Swami in His Subtle Form.

Our late Kaya was the one who had helped me to start meditation some years ago, and I was practising it regularly every day. After I came from Muddenahalli, I started to see or rather feel Swami’s formless presence along with Brother Madhusudan in my daily meditations. This went on for quite a long time. And today, I can evidently feel that Swami is talking to me within, in His subtle way and He has revealed countless proofs that He is within each of us.

​

As much as our outer Seva is like helping the needy beings, translating Swami’s words and doing media related works are essential to our spiritual development, our inner Seva, it is like getting connected to Swami and being attuned to Him. This is very significant too because the field for the inner Seva is our spiritual heart which is the true place for establishing Swami’s inner ashram eternally. Keeping that eternal heart-to-heart link with Swami is very vital for realizing our true nature. Thus, He is showing us ways of internalising everything and getting and staying connected to Him, and listening only to the answers from Him within us.