Darshan with Swami Krishnananda – 1997

by Swami Krishnananda

40. Experiencing the Beyond

(Darshan given on August 9th, 1997)

A visitor: I have experience of that which is beyond. First I have to know it; then I can experience it. How can I do that?

Swamiji: If you do not know it, how do you know it exists at all? Who told you that it exists? When you know that it exists, already you know everything about it. You said you have experienced it. Then why are you putting questions to me? When you have experienced it, there is no question afterwards. You already know what it is. A thing that is not known cannot be experienced. So you have got knowledge of it; that means experience. Everything is fine. There is no problem now. So what is your problem?

When you say 'beyond', how far beyond is it? How far? How much distance from you?

Visitor: No distance. Beyond the thought of any distance.

Swamiji: If it is not beyond physically, it is just sitting on your head. Is it so?

Visitor: But I am not aware all the time.

Swamiji: Why are you not aware?

Visitor: I don't know.

Swamiji: That is your mistake. You are thinking something else. Why are you thinking something else when this is very good and very important? When you have decided this is the right thing, the most important thing, why are you thinking something else? Where is the necessity?

Visitor: I don't know.

Swamiji: What do you feel? When you experience it, what do you feel inside?

Visitor: Nothing. There is nothing else needed.

Swamiji: Do you feel happy, always happy, no problem? You have no problems. What do you say? What is your problem now?

Visitor: I have this experience but then I neglect it afterwards, even though I can understand.

Swamiji: That's because your mind is not properly fixed on it. You are thinking something else. So do one thing. Whenever the mind goes to something else, you draw it back with the power of will, and fix the mind on it. As long as possible, fix the mind on it. But if the mind again goes to something outside, keep quiet for a few minutes. Then draw it back and again think of it as long as possible. Then after that again it goes back. Then keep quiet; don't do anything. After some time again draw the mind back. If you go on doing it again and again, again and again, again and again every day, it will not go afterwards.

You have to play a trick with the mind. You tell it, “Go outside. After some time I will call you back.” Every time you go on telling it, “You go there. I will call you after some time.” Then it will be afraid of you. Then it will not go, and then there is no problem.

You have to apply reason. We have a higher reason and a lower reason. The lower reason is only a crystallising medium of sense reports, but the higher reason tells you that you are greater than what you are. This is a very great thing. Do you feel that you are basically greater than what you are? Otherwise, you will not be pulled up to a higher level of perception. The fact that you are not satisfied with anything in the world shows that you belong to a realm where alone your requirements will be fulfilled.

The finitude of the human individual limits it to sensory perception and satisfaction, to whatever is available by contact with the sense organs. People are happy by gadgets, by fast movement, by television, by the stock market, by authority, by power. These are all empirical, outwardly motivated, whereas the higher reason tells you that you are an ambassador of a realm that transcends time and space. This is the reason why you want to overcome every limitation. You would like to conquer the whole space itself, if possible. You would like to defy time. That is the reason why you want not to die. The instinct inside, that is the eternal instinct, tells you that it is good and necessary to defy time, and the desire to expand your personality to infinite dimension is the desire to overcome spatial limitations. Finally, what you want is transcendence of space and time. This is virtually God-realisation.

Another visitor: Swamiji Vivekananda said there is a way to look at God, meet Him, see Him, realise Him. How did Vivekananda get that experience? I am not Vivekananda. I am an ordinary person.

Swamiji: If you want to meet Him, you can meet Him. If you don't want, you cannot go. If your mind is distracted and thinking a hundred things in the world, then the mind is not concentrated. To the extent your mind is able to concentrate on that eternal Reality, to that extent you will go near it. But if you are involved in worldly affairs – thinking a thousand things, going here, going there, doing this, doing that, involved in many things – and having no peace of mind, restlessness, and completely diverting the mind in all directions, then the concentration is not possible. When you are bound by the time process of distraction and multiple activities, the concentration on eternity is not possible.

So you must fulfil all your duties in the world first. You should not say that you have got duties, that you have got this duty or that duty. These duties will pull you back to the world. If you have got any duties, fulfil them 100%. Be free from all entanglements in the world. Physically you may be like anybody else, but mentally you are detached because you have done what you wanted to do. You have taken care of your family, you have earned money, you have no problem, your health is good, you are a wealthy man, you have food to eat. You will have no problem, so there is nothing to pull you to the worldly side. If that satisfaction comes, the mind will directly go to the Eternal. Then the meditation should be practised continuously on that universal Eternity. Then you will see what you would see. It cannot be explained. You will see a flash of light coming to you, and the answer will come from inside you.

But how much entanglement is there in this world? That must be taken care of. You cannot keep your legs in two different boats. Then one boat will go that side, and one boat will go this side. It should not be like that. You must sit in one boat only. One side is the boat of the world, and the other side is the boat of God. Is the mind prepared to concentrate continuously on the Universal Being, having fulfilled all the desires of the world and getting fed up with everything? You must be fed up with everything 100% because you have seen everything, enjoyed everything. There is nothing more for you to achieve. Whatever you want to see you have seen, whatever you want to enjoy you have enjoyed, and there is nothing more; then automatically the mind will go back to the eternal Reality. Then you practise meditation on that.

If the mind is perfect, and concentrated wholly, and sincerely – wholeheartedly your mind goes to that – then you will have the experience yourself. Not only Vivekananda, even you can have it. Every human being has a right and a prerogative, and whatever one had another also can have. There was nothing special in Vivekananda. He was like you. The only thing is, he was determined, and if you are also equally determined, you will get it. It requires power of will. The main thing is disentanglement from any kind of obligations which are distracting the mind in various directions.

Visitor: Probably I will have to take one more birth for that.

Swamiji: If you want to take a birth, you can take it. But if you decide you will not take it, then you need not take it. It is in your hands. Your mind should say, “I don't want to take another birth. Whatever I wanted to have in this world I have had already. Why should I have the same experience of the world ad nauseam?” Have you not learned lessons from the world? It has troubled you, it has caused you anxiety and so many other repercussions. Anyone who has seen the world properly would not like to see it a second time. If you want to see it a second time by taking another birth, it means you have not seen the world properly. You have only an insufficient knowledge of the world. You have a misconception about it.

Visitor: That is true.

Swamiji: When a tiger is sitting in front of you, if you mistake it for a cow, then you have not understood the animal properly. The world is like a tiger really, and you think it is a milch cow, but it is not so. It can swallow you completely. It has done that. The world has swallowed emperors and kingdoms; all have gone. Great emperors who ruled the whole earth, they have gone to dust. Such power the world has got. That is why I say it is a tiger. But you are thinking the world is a milking cow, so you go on asking for honey and milk and so on. That also appears. Even a tiger can give milk; it is not that it cannot give, but one day it will maul you. So once you have seen the world properly, you will never like to come back to this world. It is like having been imprisoned and you want to go to the prison a second time to see how it is. You have had enough of it; why do you want to go a second time? So why do you want to take another birth? Already it is the same repetition of the same sorrows. What you cannot achieve in this life you may not achieve in the next birth also. You are accepting that your mind is weak, and why should you accept that? You are an educated man, not a little child.

What I told you is sufficient gospel for you. You decide, determine, “I have had enough of the world. I got everything from the world. I don't want anything further. Why should I take another birth? My mind will concentrate on the Eternal Being.”

Visitor: Because my activities have become my shadow, it is difficult to give them up, and also I don't feel dissatisfied by the activities.

Swamiji: When you have satisfaction from the world, you cannot have satisfaction from God. They are two opposite poles. God will say, “Okay go. Enjoy the world, and then when you are fed up you come.”

Visitor: I have rejected God for that purpose.

Swamiji: God is not unkind. He says, “When you want the world, enjoy it. When you don't want it, then you come to Me.” So if you want to take one more birth…

But there is one thing, my dear friend: In the next birth the same predicament will start. You will have the same activity, the same entanglement, the same duty, and once again the activity will become a shadow. Whatever you are telling now will repeat itself in the next birth. It is like eczema; the more you scratch, the more it comes. Activity will never cease. It is a kind of irritation of the nerves, and this irritation will continue in the next birth also.

Anyway, I have told you something worth the while. You bestow some thought on it.

Visitor: I will do that. Thank you.