Video 64

The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna read by Swami Atmajnanananda (07/09/21)

[Music] your words are like nectar bring life to squirt souls they are praised by poets and removal sin they are auspicious to hear wonderful and exalted those who spread these words throughout the world are truly giving souls welcome everyone to our class on the gospel of sramakrishna we had a slight glitch tonight so uh if some of you were hoping to see it at eight o'clock as you uh will find that it is not we were going to do it live streaming we're recording it so it will come later of course by the time you hear me saying this it'll be the present time so it won't make any sense but anyway i'll just we're trying to send a message okay we're on the chapter with the devotees that tak chinese for part one and what happened and it's sunday june 10th 1883 the surama krishna was sitting in his room with rakhal m latu kishori ram lal hazra and other devotees so we started that last time now we're on page 241. the devotees from mani rampur asked the master how to realize god master you must practice spiritual discipline a little it will not do simply to say that milk contains butter you must let the milk set into curd and then turn it only then can you get butter from it spiritual aspirants must go into solitude now and then after acquiring love of god in solitude they may live in the world if one is wearing a pair of shoes one can easily walk over thorns now this is what is technically known as an understatement you might you must practice spiritual discipline a little actually we have to do a tremendous amount of spiritual discipline we talk about the grace of god and about simply surrendering and letting god hold our hand and take us to the goal and everything but this is uh as a result of tremendous effort on our part we we have to struggle we have to do a lot of not so much the length of time or not so much that it has to be a specific type of spiritual practice but there has to be tremendous sincerity we have to have the uh zeal that longing that yearning for god realization i i often feel that if we if we can't learn to love god we talk about loving god as if we know what it means we don't really know most people that we can learn to love spiritual practice and if we reach that point where we feel a zeal we get some joy out of it we feel some pull to do our spiritual practice to call on god to repeat the name of god to do our meditation then we've reached kind of safe ground a little bit and this is something we can do and and this is the the great paradox in spiritual life we're all longing for that tremendous uh spontaneity effortlessness grace and we're told that the way to do it is through very sincere regular uh day in and day out rigorous practice we wonder how does how does such routine backbreaking work lead to that freedom and spontaneous spontaneous feeling and joy and every it does this is this is this is what tucker says that all of our spiritual practices is men to lead to that state where we can just lean back and say okay i'm ready to practice surrender this is why the the bird on the mast has to fly as far as it can possibly fly in every direction looking for land exhausting all of the possibilities all of its own efforts before it can come back and sit on the mast and say okay and now wherever the ship takes me i'll be happy we can't do it in the beginning there'll always be that that feeling in the back of mind well i could always try i could probably get to land on my own i've maybe i'll try again tomorrow but if we exhaust all of the possibilities then we can really feel that now that nothing to do but surrender i've i've done everything possible and this is this is why i i always feel that uh there's great benefit to the meditation that's a little bit frustrating that we're we're a struggle that we're trying to control the mind the mind is running all over the place we keep trying to control it because the end result is that it brings a great spirit of feeling of dedication and we realize that we're not willing to give up our spiritual practice even if uh if it's troublesome even if it's difficult and so when he says you must practice spiritual discipline a little he's this is yes so so we we don't feel that it's impossible but at least in the beginning and very often he'll tell it when when we see how he explains things to his direct disciples it's not a little bit he'll tell them they'll wake up in the middle of the night many times they would stay in his room they would sleep in his room or sleep on the outside veranda they would would make a little bed on the floor and they would sleep for an hour or two and taco would get up in the middle of the night and wake them all up it may be midnight maybe one o'clock to avoid waking up what are you doing are you wasting your time sit for meditation and they would slump over a little bit straighten them up and he would make little things then he said go to the panchavati meditate there so he really encouraged us to do a tremendous amount of spiritual practice not just a little bit he's talking to the devotee from mani rampur we don't know who it is we don't know how sincere he is we don't know if taquer says that no day and night you have to practice meditation then he'll run away and and that will be the end of him so we can assume that this is somebody who's not a close navity we don't even know his name and maybe tucker sees that he doesn't have the inner stuff to do really hard spiritual practice most people uh it's a question of of what our capability is takwo always uses this this uh concept of aadhaar a receptacle that we're all like different parts and in pitchers and and buckets and all the different sizes and we all can hold a certain amount of water that means that we can do a certain amount of spiritual practice we can withstand a certain amount of spiritual ecstasy enjoy others it'll overflow very easily so he used to say that narendra he was a huge this huge cistern that they keep in his room filled with gandhi's water he could take a full bath there if if it was he wasn't feeling well didn't go to the ganges others would be little pitchers and things so this this yeah we don't know too much about them we were introduced before devotees from mani rampur i don't know where that is even anyhow he probably won't say that in private to his own monastic disciples he would tell them you you need to make tremendous effort for god realization then of course this going into solitude this is something that he recommends [Music] after holy company this is the most important very often they'll say if you can't get holy company then practice spiritual disciplines in solitude in solitude we don't have distractions and there's a certain degree of of internal honesty we find out who we are and what we want we're not doing it for anybody just to see uh we're we're free to do uh if we if if we want to pretend that we're sitting meditating we can read a book and do something else watch a video something that no one will know is completely up to us it's a real test of our sincerity this uh going into solitude and i had this theory that i've mentioned so many times but in the presence of other people we feel ourselves to be this visible body and we feel ourselves to be an object in the room with other people we spend a lot of time in solitude we forget that that element of our existence and we feel ourselves to be awareness to be consciousness as soon as somebody walks in then everything changes say we're sitting in a room alone and we're singing a song happily singing so somebody walks in all of a sudden this embarrassment comes self-consciousness comes and we realize that we're something visible i can be seen by somebody else if i if i'm by myself for a long time then i almost forget that uh you know there was one very nice incident when swamiji was in swamiji house pasadena when they saw him standing in front of the mirror looking at himself and they they thought i forget who it was mr handlebar oh so she thought oh he also has his vanity once this and then swamiji said something like how strange it is to see that i have a body somebody like that because he he knew himself to be the self to be this pure consciousness when we're in solitude for a long time we can have that feeling that i am that consciousness in which this whole world finds its existence so the solitude living in solitude is a tremendous spiritual practice when swamiji was traveling throughout india he his brother disciples kept trying to find him and travel with him they loved his company so much and they were concerned for his welfare and his health and everything but he loved to be alone he kept trying to leave and just practice that solitude so it's a great spiritual discipline to be able to to be able to live in solitude many people uh instantly not just a boredom but some type of existential dilemma comes that they don't know what to do or how to pass their time just alone so i mean solitude can also be so we turn on television we're all alone we're just watching but to be able to live with ourselves and know ourselves and be comfortable with ourselves and not need any external stimulus for our own pleasure to understand the nature of the self uh this comes from solitude and not everyone can do it some people they benefit more from holy company which is fine it's a little bit of a kind of a personality uh distinction some people really they're they're fit for it and they like it they love to live alone there's a beautiful buddhist poem i remember reading years ago something about walking alone like the rhinoceros huh and even you know that yeah yeah so that idea of the sadhu just going off alone because aloneness kaiwalia this is this aloneness is the is the term that they use in the sankhya yoga for god realization really realizing ourselves to be alone not lonely but we we have ourselves as our as our best friend as our best company we like being alone we like being with ourselves it's a very nice thing if we can attain to that then he says taqwa says the most important thing is faith as is a man's meditation so is his feeling of love as is a man's feeling of love so is its gain and faith is the root of all the interesting there's an interesting the the language that's used here it's a little couplet from a bengali song or poem or something like that and uh this is also this bhava is such a hard word to translate on one level it also means as is our attitude so is our gain if we do something with with a love and devotion then we'll we'll get something out of it whether whether we're successful or not if we if we try to do something and uh we do it with the perfect unselfishness longing to do it as an offering and with a very good attitude no ulterior motive or anything then we'll get that's that's the degree to which we'll benefit from it not whether it's perfectly successful we do a painting and we do the great love and devotion we want to do it as an offering and it doesn't come out so good it doesn't matter with that feeling that we had when we were doing it so we have this this saying that the lord only cares for the feeling for our heart for our love not whether we can sing beautifully we can do this or that if we do it with devotion then we gain from that yeah this faith is the root of all so they're translating that in sanskrit it's faith it can be translated in so many different ways would we say krishna how will you translate that in this context [Music] it can be faith you know it can be feeling huh or some can be conviction yeah see conviction in in sanskrit we have two words that are very often translated the same way and vishwasa and very often their faith but this vishwasa is a very deep type of conviction that comes at the very end of spiritual life is something that we have to have at the very beginning in the beginning we have to have this a little humility a little openness a little reverence for the for the tradition and for the teacher all of these things we don't have to have any deep conviction about the truth of things we approach a teacher and say i'm confused i don't really understand these things but i see your sparkling character and i see the joy in your face and i know you've achieved something please explain it to me please teach me so that i can develop this and then the teacher says okay this is this is the teaching and we start to get to develop a little conviction and then as so we're told okay that the real self is a pure awareness something different from the body and mind the senses and gradually we develop that conviction that it's true and it's just one stage before that realization i'll quote swami swanji again because he very often he used to say that conviction itself is a type of realization type of realization and many times people when people would ask him have you realized god and he said i have a little conviction he would say it that way so that meant that some type of experience conviction means the doubts are gone so some type of uh or at least we're convinced of the efficacy of it i i have a conviction that if i follow this path i'll get to the to the end it doesn't mean that i've reached the end or anything but in the beginning this is i have to have this little humility so so we translated his faith it doesn't really mean faith like you tell tell me something i believe it but it means i'm open to it i have to speak on this subject on this sunday so i'm thinking about it but say swamiji he questions every everything that you suramar krishna said did he not have shraddha he did for him that's how it manifested itself i won't accept it just because you say it but i want to understand it and because i know that uh you you're not a madman i know that i see something in you that your behavior is is a bit odd sometimes it seems like you're hallucinating and everything but look at the purity and look at the love and everything there's something there so i i i want to know but i will i want to pretend that i understand it if i don't understand it this is also type of shraddha then the devotee says sir is it necessary to have a guru now one thing we have to understand is that this guru tradition is something which many of us will assume was always there in india that there was always reverence for the teacher that there was always this tradition and spiritual life that you find in guru and that will be your guide in spiritual life but because of probably because of the the british and western thinking and independence and all of that during taqwa's time the there was a lot of skepticism about this especially the brahmos homage people they didn't they didn't accept this the guru shishya relationship they would have their acharya they would have someone who would give some type of sermon but this idea to be subservient to another person and that we can't go to god directly some some idea like that uh they they thought was some old-fashioned type of idea so very often we'll see the brahmos will ask that question and sometimes sincerely sometimes it seems like they're really saying that well this our tradition doesn't emphasize this idea of the guru but we see in so many cases how helpful and valuable it is is it necessary then i always have this reaction why do they ask is it necessary as as if it's something bad as if it's necessary to take bitter medicine to get better why don't they they ask can we do it to the brahmo people yeah you say it's not necessary okay so what if it's not necessary but what if i find it to be a tremendous aid in spiritual life very helpful in spiritual life can i do it so they said we did we don't know exactly what he's thinking if this devotee is is uh abraham or or what but talker will always give an answer that will be a little bit uh tailored to the person asking the question and this happens in two ways one he used to say i i don't like to do anything to harm the spiritual ideal of anybody so there's one thing do something that will be suitable to them sometimes he'll say oh you're gianni you'll like this type of story then he'll tell something the other thing is if he sees a defect if he sees that there's some lack that he can that he can or some misconception he'll try to very gently explain something to remove that so very often he'll he'll talk against this idea of guru and he'll say that i'm nobody's guru people who approach him and say worship penalty is the guru i'm nobody's guru i'm nothing i am i'm the dust of the dust of your feet people say things like that this is his humility is doesn't believe in this idea of the guru and then very often he'll say god himself is the guru now that doesn't mean we don't need a human guru it means we look upon the human guru as a special manifestation of the divine so we'll get lots of different types of answers to this one question so he says yes many need a guru now this to me is very similar to that statement you must practice spiritual discipline a little another kind of understatement really if we if we think about it the chances of succeeding in spiritual life and by succeeding i mean really god realization without a guru or so much lower the odds are so much more stacked against us that i don't want to say it's impossible but even with the help of a guru how many of us will become god rely souls and you know i like that that illustration that taka gives about getting hold of the chain that's connected to he says a log or treasure chest that's buried in the ocean now if somebody says well why can't i just dive down and keep diving till i find that box you can what are the chances that you'll get it but then somebody says well what if somebody hands you a chain and the chain is connected to it and you know you just go link by link by link that you absolutely will get to it one day you don't know how long how many links there are how far it is but you'll absolutely get to it won't you do it so i say is it necessary for somebody to give me the chain what a silly question is it necessary for somebody to give me the key to open the door when i could just break the door down or do you know any other way to get in it's so i always find a very odd question so he says yes many need a guru but a man must have faith in the guru's words this is that shraddha shraddha means the the classic definition is faith in the teachings of the guru and the words of the scriptures faith not again not that everything they say will will blindly follow and believe without understanding it faith that is good for us faith that uh if we if we strive to understand it we'll see the truth behind it and to be able to say i don't understand it but i know that that's my inability that i haven't been able to under there's something lacking in my understanding not to say that i don't understand it it's wrong it's false in gita if there's any such thing as a qualification for bhakti it's this is the one time when he says people lacking in shraddha shouldn't even hear these these truths this is how much emphasis he puts in this idea of shraddha if we don't have that humility if we don't have that openness if we don't realize that we don't have all the answers ourselves and as soon as somebody says something we have a counter-argument we just want to prove that they're wrong and that we're right there's no chance of gaining anything in in spiritual life so taqwa says yes many need a guru but a man must have faith in the guru's words he succeeds in spiritual life by looking on his guru as god himself now whether whether we take this literally or not jaani will say everyone is a manifestation god dwells within all beings what it really means is that we have reverence for the guru that is greater than the reverence we have for anyone else because this is the one person who is taking responsibility not just for physical life or social life or material things but for our spiritual life this is our greatest our greatest friend our greatest well-wisher in spiritual life in guru guru only cares for seeing us succeed guru wants us to be greater than himself or herself so naturally we'll we'll look upon in guru as god himself come in in human form for our welfare so if we have that type of loving relationship and we look upon it in guru as really the manifestation of grace how does grace manifest in the world if when we find in guru and we find a spiritual path then this is the first type of grace it is not the grace that we think of that the sky will open up and we'll get struck with lightning and we'll have some fall down and some trance but this is that initial grace uh which allows us to uh transform ourselves that's a whole life to be transformed takwa talks about you know the the king going to visit one of the subjects in in his small kingdom their poor people so before he he won't just walk into somebody's house he'll send his ministers first and they'll come with their cleaning equipment they'll clean up everything they'll bring some nice furniture they'll bring a nice tea set and some nice tea and everything so that when the king comes they can he can be served nicely by all of them so when all of these things come this is the first type of grace then we know it means that the god himself will enter but first we have to purify the heart and we have to prepare for it but even the desire to do that is grace is a type of grace so yes this says [Music] this is one of the three types of grace it's mentioned in this human birth the longing for liberation or for god realization and getting the grace of of these great souls who only care for our well-being therefore the vaishnavas speak of guru krishna and vaishnava there's a footnote the mastermind that the guru krishna and the vaisnava were to be equally revered we may say we look upon them all as god manifestation of god we're just to be equally revered one should honor the vaishnava the voice never hear we can just say individually of god that those who have that dedication and that longing and have that some type of divinity awakened within them or at least or on that path that we show special reverence and love to them because god dwells in his heart one should constantly repeat the name of god very often uh if taku would ask this happened in the case with somebody from from not our bhaskaran they're from uh from benares huh and uh takway asked i think who was it manila somebody went to see him and he asked what was his teaching and he said he said repeat the name of god repeat the name of rama now we would say oh anybody can say that what what type of uh a great saying does he just to give that teaching talk we say ah wonderful this is all we need there's a great teaching to follow that because repeating the name brings to mind the the object that is being named if we just do it mechanically then it will have some effect but if we do it say we we love somebody and we keep repeating their name we're thinking of them the more we repeat the more we think of the person and the more that we feel that love for them and attraction and everything so the tremendous power in the name of god one should constantly repeat the name of god the name of god is highly effective in the kali yuga the practice of yoga is not possible in this age for the life of a man depends on food yeah this we don't have to bother too much about these different yugas but the idea is that we recognize our limitations we recognize that we can spend long hours in meditation without the mind wandering without getting tired and without the body aching most most of us don't have the mental or physical strength for that and to go on long pilgrimages to do the youngness do all of these different things that we we simply don't have the constitution for it anybody can repeat the name of god the job is something that anybody can do and it's highly effective so he says the name of god highly effective in the kali yuga the practice of yoga now when taka says yoga here he's talking about meditation raja yoga this this term yoga is used in different ways in different places sometimes in in gita we see yoga it means karma yoga we have sanki yoga the sankey will be the philosophy karma yoga will be the practice so it's used in different ways when taka uses it especially in this context he's talking about raja yoga or or meditation is not possible that means that this very strict type of of meditative practice where we try to steal all of the abilities of the mind and and make the mind perfectly quiet and everything it's very difficult very few people can do that even taquer had trouble doing it of course he did it but so we practice yoga and meditation with a with a good dose of of devotion added to it and it's very helpful and easier for us that way and repeating the name of god and everything clap your hands while repeating god's name and the birds of your sin will fly away now this sounds like a a very beautiful poetic thing but tucker meant it literally and he did it that when he would get up in the morning he would go around in front of the pictures repeating them and clap his hands and we know that funny incident when totopuri said he was from punjab and in punjab when they make their chapatis they won't use a rolling pin they'll go like this huh do it back and forth so when he saw talker taking the name of god and clapping his hands he said what are you doing you're making chapatis he said but he would do that he would taco for taco everything that he could do in a literal tangible way physical way left a deeper impression on the mind so even something like clapping our hands it gives that joyful feeling so he recommended all of these things one should always seek the company of the holy men holy man means holy people holy men and holy women taco used to say that that this is one thing that we can never get too much of it's not not that oh i've already seen that holy person and now i'll try to see another one then i've seen them and i i don't need to do it anymore the more we keep their company the more some transference comes the more we benefit and where we feel that that joy and that conviction and that calmness that will get all of those those things that uh just just to their company only we have to be receptive and of course uh we're told to ask questions also that we ask questions we show our reverence we do a little service all of these things these are all helpful things the nearer you approach the ganges the cooler the breeze will feel if if we say we want to approach god well we don't know exactly how to do it if we can approach a god-like person or a god-realized person or someone whose whole life is devoted to god then we get that similar type of benefit the nearer you approach the ganges the cooler the breeze will feel again the nearer you go to a fire the hotter the air will feel but one cannot achieve anything through laziness and procrastination people who desire worldly enjoyment say about spiritual progress well it will all happen in time we shall realize god sometime or other this is okay for for i would say the majority of people taqwa was he came really for for a handful of people with regard to this intensity of spiritual life and he came for everybody with regard to setting an ideal which people can gradually try to attain to but for this this the group of people who came to him while he was living and and it's his inner circle he couldn't bear to see them not have that intensity and and that that tremendous longing and feel that uh i don't want to waste a second they they just this is the real meaning of that bakulota that life is miserable without the realization of god he wanted to see that in them to increase that type of longing in them but this this is really they were born with such tremendous uh some scott is in purity of heart and longing for god that that can be their teaching for us this is this is the final stage we have to do whatever we can to try to increase it we shouldn't feel bad if we don't have it it's a very rare thing and if we get it this is this is that glow of pink in the sky before the sun comes up says that so that's the final stage if if somebody says that i have to realize god this very moment or else life isn't worth living it doesn't mean anything okay for most people and some people they may have a little type of derangement or something we don't want somebody to kill themselves if if they start to have that type of feeling it doesn't mean that it's a different type of thing i've always been curious about this pandalav panalao patacharya the great singer of the ram prasad songs he committed suicide when he's very young and whole whole soul was given to singing these songs to the divine mother and i always thought he must have he must have known studied the life of taku and everything did anybody know anything about his personal life no yeah i mean in his case it could have been a very sincere type of thing but anyhow for for us at least we have to if we don't have this this tremendous longing for god we can't live in another minute at least we have to get rid of this procrastination and say i'll put it off i can do it later because we form bad habits and the the desire to do it later becomes less and less if we don't do it now really uh the habits that we form in spiritual life uh that are done when we're young or the best though those who come to spiritual life at a very at a young age and form these these uh habits get into this practice of doing regular spiritual disciplines then they're set for life a little harder when we're older of course when we're older we've seen enough of life to to benefit from that that no i've seen that i don't want that i'm done with that that's also a benefit but those who start from a very young age can uh get develop this longing and this this this really uh a type of attachment to spiritual practice that we don't want to miss it that it becomes integral it becomes a part of our life like the food that we have the water we drink the sleep that we get if we can get that feeling then we're on safe ground a little bit in spiritual life i said to keshav sen when the father sees that his son has become restless for his inheritance he gives him his share of the property even three years before the legal time so we may say that yes doing my spiritual practice i'm making some progress this and that that by the end of life i should be able to have some type of realization okay then somebody else says no i want it now i want it this second and they they say i i won't let you go until i get it those people can sincerely do it problem is that we don't do it sincerely we say yeah that's true but there's a basketball game tonight let me watch that first we just don't have that there's nothing wrong with it we shouldn't feel guilty or that we're not bad people or anything but it's a very rare soul and as a result of long spiritual practice or very good some scottish or some type of grace that don't care for anything but god the very very rare thing and we've seen some of our great swamis really wonderful swamis they also have other interests now they may have had some type of realization also but many of them they'll enjoy other things also so but yeah we have to be careful about comparing ourselves to him no but i'm saying his case is really different he had to do these things to keep his mind down is the opposite he did take some and this is also after after it's god realization when he was in the midst of his uh his spiritual madness would he have gone to the theater then he didn't know anything but mother yeah and then afterwards he needed something to keep the mind from constantly getting merged in brahmin so that's a little bit different yeah yeah but i'm saying this is all after this is all after it's got realization everything yeah he had his human side to him yeah everybody has his human side the avatar has a human side they can also enjoy things as the avatar he had to have these traits that we can identify with also yeah and if he didn't it would be so hard for us to even feel that we live in the same planet that he lived on so yeah but still we can't say and we we have to say still he knew nothing but god everything else that he enjoyed still it's all divinity and a little different a mother keeps on cooking while the baby is in bed sucking its toy but when it throws the toy away and cries for her she puts down the rice pot and takes the baby in her arms and nurses it i said all this to queso queso of course was the leader of the brahmos homage at that time anyhow what these what tucker is telling us is that we need a little sense of urgency a little sense of urgency that we don't want to reach the end of our lives and and have regrets this is a very very important thing even if we don't have god realization if we can come to the end of our life and say yes i made a sincere honest attempt in god realization i really tried to live my life as an offering i tried to uh follow all of these teachings i tried to be sincere i tried to be unselfish i have all of my faults i have all of my weaknesses i know all of that but at least i tried then we can have some contentment at the end of our lives otherwise i've seen i've seen those even even some of our monks at the end they say i could have done so much more why didn't i go to the shrine when i showed it why didn't i do this was filled with some type of regret it was a very sad thing to see so at least even from that point of view just to have a little contentment at the end that uh we we did what we're supposed to do in this life there's a great statement this family turian on the main somebody asked him about that he said i feel that i've done what one is meant to do in this lifetime something like that yeah for him of course that meant god realization for us it means sincerely trying making a very sincere this sincerity is the key to everything if we can be sincere in life and it's not so easy we we can talk about being sincere the only one who knows if we're sincere is ourselves we deep down we know to what extent we really mean what we say and believe what we say we believe and all of that if we but we try we try to be sincere it is said that in the kali yuga if a man can weep for god one day and one night he sees him so this is uh this is the benefit of being born in this in this yoga and there's a age that the requirements are less but this means not just day and night it means 24 hours a day this means really that with with great intensity weeping for god taco used to say so many times that people shed jug fulls of tears for wife and husband and children and parents and and the land and all these things but who weeps for god we may do it just every once in a while we'll feel something tears will come many it happens to many people it's a very wonderful thing if he ever hears about that that someone will say oh we saw so and so the other day weeping for god will say ah wonderful how wonderful it is but 24 hours straight to do it huh it's not a joke taku did it for something like six the months period that he had as for his first period of sadhana feel peaked at god and say to him now this is a very typical attitude of the of the shaktas the worshipers of the divine mother there's man of iman the the same way that a child will feel towards the mother that i asked you for that you didn't give it to me i'm not going to look at you i'm going to tell everybody what you did a little bit of hurt pride it's very nice it's hard to to give a good definition for this obiman how will you explain it you gave birth to me you have to reveal yourself to me you have to do it am i nobody huh am i chop liver you have to yeah yeah so forcing the the demands that tucker liked this idea so it's uh feel peaked at god and say to him you have created me now you must reveal yourself to me whether you live in the world or elsewhere always fix your mind on god so taka didn't like too much of the distinction between oh this is a monk this is a householder the monk can achieve anything a householder can't do anything that's all the question of where the mind is if we can fix the mind on god then it doesn't matter where we are it doesn't matter what stage of life we're in what type of work we do of course it has to be ethical in everything it's not that we can do anything but uh the main thing is where is the mind the mind is is the key to the whole thing so whether you live in the world or elsewhere always fix your mind on god the mind soaked in worldliness may be compared to a wet matchstick tucker uses this this illustration of soaking the mind very often we soak it in the dye of the world he says that the mind is like cloth just come back from the laundry that if we want to dye something then we want it nice and clean and white white cloth we stick it in the dye and it'll take if it's if it's a little bit dirty and oily and everything it won't take to die so this is a way of saying that the mind will easily pick up that we're very susceptible to associations and and uh whatever company we keep and everything so if if we live in the with worldly people then we're soaking the mind in worldliness if we do worldly things if we spend all of our time on just enjoyments and pleasures and all of that then the mind gets soaked that way then it becomes like a wet matchstick you won't get a spark however much you may rub it so we can do all the meditation all the spiritual practice that we want if the mind is soaked in worldliness if the mind is damp we can't get a spark out of it ekka lavia placed the clay image of drona his teacher in front of him and thus learned archery there's a footnote the story is in the mahabharata drona refused to teach a golovia archery because the latter belonged to a low caste thereupon eka lavia went to the forest and practiced archery before the clay image of drona whom he regarded as his teacher in course of time he became an expert archer when drona discovered that he excelled even arjuna the rhona's most beloved disciple in this art he asked echolavia to give him his thumb as the teacher's fee by carrying out this order egg olivia demonstrated his spirit of self-sacrifice and also his love for his teacher now why does takara mention this story i think he hasn't forgotten that initial question is the guru necessary he's going all around this way in that way and everything to come back to this idea even if it's even if it's in the form of an image that is guru is necessary somehow go forward the wood cutter following the instructions of the holy man went forward and found in the forest sandalwood and mines of silver and gold and going still farther he found diamonds and other precious stones this is tucker's way of saying that in in spiritual life we reach plateaus and sometimes we may think that that plateau is is good enough we've reached a nice space we're happy with that that we do enough meditation so that afterwards we feel a little bit calm we feel rested and everything then tucker said okay that's okay but don't you know that there are stages beyond that where you'll feel tremendous joy keep going a little further and you'll see that you've just reached the first stage so uh eat after each one don't think you're reaching when you've reached the end you'll know it and that's a different story when we have that ultimate realization no one will have to tell us that we reach the final stage any further place to go we'll know it this is this is the test that uh it carries within it its own pramana huh is itself uh swayams something like that self-proven so the wood cutter following following the instructions of the holy man went forward and found in the forest sandalwood and mines of silver and gold and going still farther he found diamonds and other precious stones the ignorant are like people living in a house with clay walls there is very little light inside and they cannot see outside at all but those who enter the world after attaining the knowledge of god are like people living in a house made of glass for them both inside and outside or light they can see things outside as well as inside now takwa makes two different statements similar things at different times he'll say first realize god then live in the world and then we think what in the world is he talking about other times he'll say first develop devotion then live in the world that we can do when he says first realize god we have to take it as meaning that get established in spiritual life feel get some conviction uh reach that level of of of safety somehow then live in the world if it's if it's uh waiting until you have god realization before we do anything in the world how how many people can do that very few people can do it so i think when he says first develop devotion that's that's a way of understanding what he means first realize god and then live in the world first of all after people who realize god they won't come back we don't know how many people if we have that really highest type of realization that near recovery samadhi and every everything very few people can come back from that so at least at least realize that this is the one goal of life that this is our true nature that i'm living some type in some type of false reality not knowing what things really are and the value of things and that i i've been given some teaching which i accept at least get established in that then we'll have a little safety taco says in another place getting this bhakti is like wearing shoes and we can walk over the thorns we have to go through a forest full of thorns if we develop this bhakti the love of god knowledge of god also a little bit then we'll be safe we we won't get the thorn stuck in our feet nothing exists except the one that one is the supreme brahman so long as he keeps the eye in us he reveals to us that it is he who has the primal energy creates preserves and destroys the universe now i'm going to stop we'll start with this next time we get into a whole new topic here very we get a little bit of philosophy all of these philosophical points have a psychological way of understanding them also which i'll talk about a little bit next time that uh we don't have to say that brahmanalone is real but this this is the the one reality that there's something that substantial that we can hold on to we don't have to say the world is like a dream in any metaphysical sense but we all know sometimes it has this dream like quality to it so a psychological point of view anyhow we'll stop there and uh for those of you who tried to uh log on at eight o'clock uh to see this well this enjoying the class uh we apologize and we'll get it today for some change in this in the format this time okay we will end with our chant [Music] is a medium we bow our heads before suramar krishna who is stainless of infinite nature whose heart melts in sympathy for his devotees who is an embodiment of the divine and the supreme lord and ever worthy of our worship [Music] peace peace peace be unto all i want to remind everybody also of a slight change in our format now this this friday night class i used to do it ahead of time but we're starting at eight o'clock if anybody double vaccinated people anybody wants to come and attend in person you're all welcome as you can see we're conducting it in the basement for now okay thank you