Darshan of Swami Krishnananda in 1998

by Swami Krishnananda

39. Renunciation

(Darshan given in November 1998)

Swamiji [to a visitor]: Dharma is not a thing. It is a circumstance, a condition, and an awareness of achievement. The whole thing is consciousness, ultimately. The world does not exist as any hard stuff, and so what will you throw? There is nothing to throw. You are throwing only the foolishness that is in the mind. You throw away fever by taking medicine. Can you say, “Oh, I have lost the fever”? Will anybody say that? You have rejected the fever by medicine.

'Renunciation' means the renunciation of the wrong idea that the world is outside you. Anybody who believes that the world is outside oneself has renounced nothing. You may go to biksha or Kali Kambali, or to anybody. It is number one useless. That which binds you is the awareness that the world is outside you and is harassing you. But you forget that you cannot stand outside the world. If your consciousness affirms that you are indivisible as the world is, and you cannot stand outside it, then sudden illumination will rise up. The total consciousness will rise up like this, like the ocean swallowing all the rivers in one minute.

Simply reading commentaries – Sankaracharya commentary, this commentary – any commentary you read, you will get nothing. It requires a little bit of experience. In one minute you can become beautifully happy. It takes one minute for you to be supremely happy. You can become a saint in one minute if this consciousness enters you: There is nothing that I need, because the whole world is identical with my existence. Whatever are the building bricks of this body are the same as the building bricks of this universe. So in what way am I outside it?

There is an objection arising from space-time. There is some screen between us and the truth, which is called space-time. You can reject the consciousness of there being something called a screen between you and the world by contemplating on space itself. You become the dacoit yourself; then you need not have fear from dacoits. You contemplate on space itself. You yourself are space, so how will it divide you from another thing? You are the space-time complex yourself. The whole thing has enlarged itself into an unimaginable completeness. It is not merely thinking, it is not arguing, it is not attempting. In one second you jump into this.

“I am Navneet Pragya Desai.” Who told you that you are Navneet Pragya Desai? By some means you have identified yourself with it, and you cannot become Mr. John. You are not Mr. John. You are this only. If you assert another thing, that also is you only. Consciousness can work miracles, and an instantaneous miracle will take place. All the cells of the body will start vibrating.

The outsideness of the world is the trouble in this world. We have no other trouble. “When God created the world,” says the Aitareya Upanishad – it is one image, it is a kind of descriptive way of putting it – that part which was separated from the whole fell down with head down and legs up. It started seeing everything ulta [upside down]. That which is outside looks like inside, and that which is inside looks like outside. You came after the creation of the world, so who is first and who is second? So you are the effect; the world is the cause. But you think that is the effect and you are a very important man. This is the mistake. And the moment it fell down, upside down, hunger and thirst caught hold of it. It wanted to grab what is outside it. Hunger and thirst are the processes of consciousness where it wants to grab what is outside it.

You cannot be satisfied with yourself. You want to grab that which is not you. But the 'not you' cannot come to you at any time because the word 'not' separates you from the thing that you are desiring. The subject cannot become the object. If it can become it, then why do you call it an object? Suppose I sit and think: I am Navneet Pragya. I am not Swami Krishnananda, I am Navneet Pragya. Same face – my face is just like yours. Same shirt and same pants I have got. If I go on thinking very deeply, I will think as you think, and you will think as I think. This is called samadhi. This procedure you can adopt with anything in the world. Even a tree will speak to you. You are rejecting the tree because it is outside. No, it is not like that. I am the tree itself. The leaves will speak to you. Vana Devata – there are divinities operating through the forests.

There was a boy called Satyakama Jabala. He went to a Guru for initiation. The Guru said, “You take 400 cows and go to the forest and take care of them, and don't come back until they multiply into 1,000.” In those days Gurus were very hard. No food or anything, poor man. He did it. They multiplied into 1,000, and when he came back with 1,000 cows, he asked Guruji to initiate him. Guruji went away on tour. He didn't care. Nature took pity on him. Fire, Agni, manifested itself. “Here is one part.” Air took the form of a teacher, and taught him. Nature started teaching him, and he was illumined. His face was shining. Each one taught one fourth of the truth of Brahman, and he came back shining. Guruji said, “How is it your face is shining today? Who told you anything?”

“Not any human being, Maharaj,” he said.

He said, “Now there is nothing more for you to learn.”

When you have done your duty and you are sincere 100%, nature will protect you. Nature is yourself only.