Darshan with Swami Krishnananda during 1997

by Swami Krishnananda

17. Many Realms at the Same Time

(Darshan given on February 26th, 1997)

Swamiji: A person can be in many places at the same time. In one realm of being you are doing something; in another realm of being you are doing another thing. And there are an infinite number of realms of being, and in all the realms you are operating simultaneously. In one realm you may be a king, in another realm you can be a beggar, in a third you are a brahmachari, in a fourth you are working hard, in a fifth you are something else. Anything is possible due to the variety of karmas embedded in your heart. These experiences of multiple personalities doing varieties of things is due to the work of the infinite variety of karmas that you have performed since many incarnations.

So you are everywhere, doing varieties of things. Only thing is, now here you are bound to the space-time complex of this world, so you are thinking only this body. The other space-time complexes are cut off; you cannot see them, just as you cannot see the people that you saw in dream. They are also real only. These are not unreal people. When you enter that realm, you see them wandering there. Actually, the people you saw in dream are existing. They are not unreal phantoms. They are existing in some realm. And whatever you saw, whatever you were, whatever you did experience in dream, you are actually experiencing in some realm.

So you have got a multiple personality, and that you are confined unfortunately to one particular personality only is a suffering that is caused. If you realise that your personality is multiple, and that in every realm you are doing different things simultaneously, you become a cosmic operator. There is no difference between dream and waking. Both are equally real. When a dream is there, it is as real as this. And when you wake up to the mahat tattva of the cosmic consciousness, this will look like dream. But it is not dream when you are experiencing it.

Actually, there is something beyond the cosmic mind also. So every level will look like something inferior in comparison with the higher, but by itself nothing is inferior. Everything is perfectly all right. Everything is a lesser truth, but not untruth. There is no such thing as untruth in the world. There is only a lesser truth. From untruth you cannot go to the truth. It is not possible because there is no ladder from untruth to truth. But from the lesser truth to the higher truth there is a ladder. If the world is totally unreal, you cannot go to God because unreal things cannot help you in going up. So the world is not unreal; it is a lesser real. It is a ladder that enables you to go up to God.

So don't say anything is a non-entity and it doesn't exist, and all that. It exists. Anything that consciousness approves as existent is existing in a particular time and space. If your consciousness says it exists, it is really there. And if the consciousness feels it is not there, it is really not there. So you cannot say what is there and what is not there. Everything is there if your consciousness says it is there. Any level of experience is there, and no untruth exists. It is a lesser truth only.

So you must be very happy to hear this, that you are living in a wonderful world, and you are blessed.

A visitor: May I have a better definition of a lesser truth and truth?

Swamiji: That which is less comprehensive is the lesser truth. That which is more comprehensive is the higher truth. That which includes more of the universe into itself is the higher truth. That which includes a lesser part of the universe…

Now you are a person. As an individual confined to the physical body, you are a lesser truth than the community of human beings to which also you belong. You may say the nation is a larger truth than an individual. Because you are merged into that, you are included. The international system of administration is a larger truth than the localised country's national system. And the world as a whole, when it operates, is to be considered as a larger reality than what is happening merely here. Finally, the largest truth is that which includes everything in space and time, and when you come down to the lower level of wholeness… Everything is a whole only. You are a whole person, the family is a whole, the village is a whole, the district is a whole, the state is a whole, the country is a whole, the world is a whole, and everything is a whole only, but lesser wholes and bigger wholes. A little baby is a whole person, and a grown-up person is a whole person. A very mature person like you is a whole person. Even when you become old, you are a whole person.

So wholeness has degrees of comprehensiveness. You are an elderly, mature person, a whole in your own self, but your comprehensiveness as a whole, as an adult, a grown-up, mature person, is wider than the wholeness of a little child in the mother's womb. So like that, everything is a whole only. Everything is a holistic movement. There is no fraction anywhere. Even an insect is a whole, an elephant is a whole. Everything is a whole. A leaf is a whole, a plant is a whole. There is no fraction anywhere. Only they are less comprehensive in comparison with the higher one to which they belong and of which they are a part. Do you understand me?

Visitor: Yes. Thank you.

Swamiji: Thank you. Hari Om. Om Namo Narayanaya.