Sai Baba’s earliest period was with his original parents who had deserted him. They had given him away. His stay with them was far too short, for any noticeable development or change of personality.
The next stage of life reached by Baba, was when he stayed with the fakir who received him. This period lasted for at least four or five years. It spanned almost from the first to the sixth year, which was the most impressionable period of Baba’s whole life.
This fakir appears to have been a very advanced Sufi. He and his wife seem to have loved Sai Baba tenderly. They brought him up with all attention and care.
In the case of Sai Baba, the father and mother are the earliest Gods. The fakir and his wife must have given him the idea of God. They must have responded to his love and his need for protection.
After the fakir died, his wife took Baba to the Selu zamindar. The zamindar was Gopal Rao Deshmukh, a perfect lover of God Tirupati Venkatesa.
Here again Baba’s destiny was that his previous line of thinking, feeling and being should be continued and not disturbed. The love which began under the fakir became still more powerful, under the care of Gopal Rao Deshmukh or Venkatesa.
He was perpetually attending upon Venkatesa Gopal Rao Deshmukh. This was in a way which the Guru Gita aptly described. Baba was like a peon. He was ever ready at hand to carry out the Chieftain’s orders.
There was no distraction of games or playmates or rivalry or any examination to trouble Baba. His whole heart ran on to the Master. Baba himself gives a description in BCS 175 which applies here also:
‘I loved to gaze at him all the while, and even for a few seconds if he were not there to see, I would not like to have eyes at all. I did not wish to go back. I forgot all things but the Guru. My life was concentrated in my sight and my sight in him. That was the object of my meditation. In silence, I bowed‘. These words referred to a Guru of a former life probably.
But the description of the contact with the latest Guru in BCS 178 as given below is on the same lines and as follows:
‘For 12 years I waited on my Guru who is peerless and loving. How can I describe his love to Me?. When he was in Dyanastha ie. love trance, I sat and gazed at him. We were both filled with Bliss. I cared not to turn my eye upon anything else. Night and day I pored upon his face with an ardour of love that banished hunger and thirst. The Guru’s absence for a second made me restless.
I meditated on nothing but the Guru, and had no goal, or object, other than the Guru. Unceasingly fixed upon him was my mind. Wonderful indeed, the art of my Guru! I wanted nothing but the Guru and he wanted nothing but this intense love from me. Apparently inactive, he never neglected me, but always protected me by his glance.
That Guru never blew any mantra into my ear. By his grace, I attained to my present state. Making the Guru the sole object of one’s thoughts and aims one attains Paramartha, the Supreme Goal.“
The positive and the negative go together in this early period. This means thorough detachment from the world and thorough attachment to God or the Guru representing God. However, it might be of great importance in making up Baba’s life.
The life of Baba was to be a life of perfection. After Mahasamadhi, this should be fully recognised as the Divine operating without limitations of time or place. It is for the benefit, not of one individual or one country but for all.
"I draw to Me, My man from far off or even across the seven Seas to Shirdi, like a sparrow with a string fastened to its feet"-Shirdi Sai Baba, Indian Spiritual Guru-God 