The Tree of Life -3.9: Swami Krishnananda.

-

Chinmaya International Foundation (CIF):

Uttama-purusa, as Bhagavan Ram is fondly called, lead a life that teaches us ways to lead a life of perfection and integrity.

Ramayana gives a beautiful glimpse at the leadership and life affirming qualities of Bhagavan Rama. 

In this enlightening discourse, Swami Ramakrishnananda expounds the nuances of Valmiki's Ramayana. 

Swamiji refers to 2 epics based on Valmiki's Ramayana, 

Kamba Ramayana composed by Poet Kamba during the 12th century

& Raghuvamsa written by Kalidasa in the 15th century.

Listen in, be inspired and lead a life filled with honesty and integrity at 

http://chinfo.org/.../f580db38-3030-4afe-88e6-91d483c7881d

===============================================================

Wednesday 31, Jan 2024 07:10.

Discourse 3: Severing the Root of this Tree of Life - 9.

===============================================================

Our deeper levels in the inner layers of our psyche are connected to subtle objects of sense, and these are the impulses that disturb our meditations and even the very thought of God. How can anyone be seated throughout the day and think of God? We will feel restless and out of sorts because of the unnaturalness of this thought. It is a wonder that the thought of God should appear as unnatural and be rushed forward into the outer atmosphere to become natural.

Don't you feel, even all you people seated here, a slight sense of relief when you finish the satsanga and go out? “Oh, the boredom is finished. Let us breathe.” You feel a sense of limitation and uneasiness when you are restrained like this inside a hall. This is unnatural satsanga, if going out of this place is natural to your minds. If you feel a sense of relief when you go out into the open air, and feel the other way around when you are inside the hall, this sadhana is unnatural. But if you feel restless when you go out—“Oh, it is over. I want it more. I want to be seated here. I want to listen. I want to contemplate. I want to absorb myself in this idea”—then your sadhana is natural. Otherwise, the kitchen would be natural, the shop would be natural, not the satsanga here.

Unfortunately, likewise is our meditation on God. It has somehow or other become unnatural to us. Japa is unnatural, worship is unnatural. Who would like to sit there? It is a great headache. We would like to go out as early as possible. The whole of sadhana becomes a nuisance to the innermost layer of our personality. But we force ourselves to believe the other way around. “No, no, it is not like that. I want God.” Who is telling this? It is our conscious level, which is the least part of us, the weakest part, and perhaps the most unreliable part. The reliable part, our real substance, is inside, and it is connected to objects of sense by a power of prehension, which is different from the apprehensions of the conscious mind. So this asaṅgaśastreṇa dṛḍhena chittvā (B.G. 15.3) admonition of the Bhagavadgita will be like pouring water on the rock of the human mind if its implications are not properly understood. We will be simply chanting and chanting, and gaining nothing.

We cannot really love God, let us be honest to ourselves, because we have subtle loves for our children, for our families, for our properties, which of course we will deny outright if it is told. We say it is not so, that we are fed up with everything. But we are not fed up because, again to reiterate, we have a personality deeper than the one which we know about ourselves, and we cannot know what we are thinking.

So there is, again, a very great necessity before us to sit at the feet of powerful Masters who emanate a force of rejuvenation and positive thinking, who have dedicated themselves entirely to God-living, and whose totality of being is immersed in the search for this great Reality. All people cannot succeed in this attempt because we cannot go under our own skin and enter into our own psyche.

Therefore, blessed souls, I evoke the blessings and the grace of the Almighty upon you all that you have time enough to think over these difficulties, and do not think that everything is milk and honey in this world. There is neither milk here, nor honey, nor friends in this world. You have terrible problems before you every moment of time if you mistake things for what they are not. God is before you, and nothing else is before you.

End

=======================================================

Next

The Relevance of the Bhagavadgita to Humanity

The First Six Chapters of the Bhagavadgita: Swami Krishnananda

To be continued

===============================================================

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Spiritual Import of the Mahabharata and the Bhagavadgita : Ch-5. Part-5.( Last Part)

-
Image
5: God is Our Eternal Friend-5. ( Last Part ) We are filled with doubts in our minds—we can prepare a dictionary of all our doubts—they are endless. Everywhere we have a suspicious attitude about the world, about things, about people, about ourselves, about the past, about the present, and about the future. These doubts cannot be dispelled until knowledge arises, and we know what knowledge means, an insight into which we have been given in the second chapter of the Gita. Knowledge is the knowledge of God ultimately, and as a result, knowledge of the nature of the world in its reality, as mentioned in the third chapter. This is true knowledge, and when we are awakened to this real knowledge, all doubts get dispelled. Then what happens? Atmavantam—we become truly possessed of the Self that we really are. We are people who have lost ourselves and are in pursuit of things outside. Yes, this is what has happened; we have grasped the world and lost our own selves, and we are
Read more

The Spiritual Import of the Mahabharata and the Bhagavad gita : Ch-10. Part-3.

-
Image
Chapter 10: The Imperishable Among All that is Perishable : Part-3. We are told in the Puranas that Narayana or Vishnu takes incarnations for the preservation of creation. Vishnu is regarded as yajna itself. It is the highest sacrifice—God sacrificing himself every moment of time for the sustenance of His creation. As adhiyajna He is the administrative power and the methodology of the working of the cosmos. All activity is comprehended under this yajna of the cosmos. Therefore God is present in all activity when it is considered as a passage to God, when it is regarded as a manifestation of God as rays emanating from the sun. Those wise souls who envisage God as adhibhuta, adhidaiva and adhiyajna, which means to say, who encounter God as a comprehensive Absolute and not merely existing only here or there, such devotees are true knowers. They can entertain or maintain this consciousness even at the time of passing from this world—they are not deprived of th
Read more

The Spiritual Import of the Mahabharata and the Bhagavadgita : Ch-9. Part-8.

-
Image
9: The Unity of the Lover and the Beloved : Part-8. The distressed souls seeking God are of one type. One who is baked in the fire of samsaram,who is tortured in this hell of earth, suffering through various sorrows, seeks riddance from the grief of the world by resort to God under the impression that God is like a parent—a father or a mother or a supreme saviour. The intention behind this devotion is redress—freedom from sorrow, the inability to bear suffering. This is the reason here behind the devotion to God. Whether this could be an adequate reason, anyone can contemplate independently for oneself. Can we love God merely because He is the only source of redemption from our sorrows? Do we want freedom from sorrow, or do we want God? That is a different question that will come up later on. Swami Krishnananda To be continued  ....
Read more