Darshan of Swami Krishnananda in 1999

by Swami Krishnananda

29. Majesty and Beauty

(Darshan given in May 1999)

Swamiji: ... causes distress. The higher thing dissatisfies you because before that higher thing you feel small. You feel very small even before an elephant. You cannot go near it. You simply look at the elephant. You enjoy the sight of the elephant. The joy due to the perception of the elephant is due to an inward acceptance of the subdual of your egoism and importance before that large body. You feel small before the whole ocean. You feel small before an elephant. That feeling small before something higher, bigger, is due to the ego's diminishing at that time. Your importance is defied by the elephant. It doesn't care for your importance. The ocean also doesn't care for you. So at that time you feel a lessening of your personality-consciousness. The more you reduce the sense of egoism, personality-consciousness, the more happy you feel.

There are two things: majesty and beauty. The whole world is consisting of two things. Majesty is in the ocean, and I gave examples such as the elephant. That's why you feel a sense of awe before them. Beauty is in the full moon. You see the full moon. Again and again, again and again you like to see that, as if honey is oozing out through the rays of the full moon. Nobody is tired of looking at the full moon. That is the symbol of beauty. Beauty attracts a person, whatever be the beauty, and majesty also attracts.

When you see a wrestler, a huge muscular body, you feel small before him because of the marked difference between your capacity and that man's capacity. You compare the elephant's capacity to your capacity, and there your egoism subsides; and so is the case with the ocean. The ocean does not care for any person. It simply swallows a person. This is called sublimity. We have no proper example of beauty, perfect beauty. Tentative beauty we have got, but perfect beauty... You see the round face of the full moon. You go on looking at it. You feel a sense of coolness.

Ayurveda acharayas say this beautiful moon oozes out nectar. The herbs and plants and trees on the full moon are supposed to be energised by the oozing effect of the full moon, which is nectarine. That is why scriptures say on full moon and amavasya day you should not pluck any plant because the moon is present there. Moon represents the mind. You should not pluck even the leaf of a tulsi in the night. If you want tulsi, take it in the morning. The trees and the plants should not be interfered with on full moon day and new moon day.

Not only the plants, even the human being is affected. You know, the full moon pulls the ocean up. There is a high tide. The moon does not pull only the water, it pulls the whole Earth. Now, as the Earth is solid, we are not feeling that the moon is pulling it up. It pulls our brain also. On full moon day and amavasya day some disturbance takes place in the minds of people unless they are well disciplined, intellectually bright.

Just I'm mentioning to you the greatness of this creation, the infinitude of Reality.

Open your eyes. Take a deep breath. What am I seeing all around? It is the body of God that is spread out everywhere. The being of God is efflorescing like waves in the ocean in the form of this great universe. What am I seeing? I am seeing His manifestation. I am seeing Him only. And where are you at this time? You are also a part of the manifestation. So who is contemplating, actually? You should not say, “I am meditating on God,” because you are included in this great inclusiveness of God's creation. You should not bring your personality, individuality, in the middle. When He is all in all, you cannot exist outside Him. So who is meditating? The whole universe is meditating. You have melted down, like a wave melting in the ocean, like a bubble becoming the sea, like rays of the sun going back to the sun. You withdraw your affirmation of your individuality as so-and-so. You are not even a human being. You are only a ray of the Almighty operating.

You need not close the eyes, because it causes distraction. Look around. “I am seeing the glory of the great Universal Supreme Ishvara, Paramatma. I am not seeing, because I am included in this mighty manifestation. That is contemplating on itself, and it is contemplating on me also, incidentally. The ocean contemplates on the waves, in a sense, because the waves are inseparable from the ocean. Why am I meditating? I achieve utter perfection. I have got so many commitments here. I have got the family.” This will be taken care of by that Great Being. You work twenty years to satisfy your family relationship, and God can satisfy it in one second. Ananyāś cintayanto māṁ ye janāḥ paryupāsate, teṣāṁ nityābhiyuktānāṁ yogakṣemaṁ vahāmy aham (B.G 9.22): “Whoever contemplates Me as the All-pervading Being incessantly, without diverting attention to something outside, to take care of that person is My responsibility.” So He has taken pratijna: I shall take care of you.

But the sense of egoism – I am so-and-so – is not easily to go like that. You will always continue to feel that you are a very big man. You will not equate yourself to the position of a peon.

A visitor: That it is not happening to us, and say something bad has happened, then how to accept that this is...

Swamiji: Suppose there are two children playing on a street, and on one of the children a truck passes over. The parents whose child has not been hurt will thank God for His greatness – “Oh God, how kind You are” – but they are not considering the death of the other child. Now, God is kind for that one also, who has been crushed? The eyes of God are different from the eyes of men. On one side, the parents will be crying, beating their breast: “Our child has gone!” On the other side: “God is very kind.” God has neither blessed anybody, nor has He shown anger at anybody. Some operation is taking place.

There are officials who do not like a transfer, but governmental adjustment requires transfer. You cannot simply protest against it. So is the case of transfer of everything. You cannot stick to one idea. All the ideas are God's idea, but to consider that all the ideas are God's idea is very difficult because we cannot give up the idea that we are what we are. This requires a lot of training, day and night thinking that One alone is, and in that One you are also included.