Facets of Spirituality

by Swami Krishnananda

Compiled by S. Bhagyalakshmi

Undated-2

Visitor: How can yoga practice get us strength?

Swamiji: Your affiliation to God is your strength. It will save you in this life and in your future life also. What I am telling you is yoga without giving it a label, yet it includes all the yogas. You want a living yoga which is helpful in your practical existence—not yoga only for demonstration or an institution. This is a thing with which you can exist and keep yourself balanced and happy, without complaint against anything. The yogi sees everything in its proper place. When you see a thing misplaced, then it is not yoga, and then you complain.

Yoga is nothing but a comprehensive outlook on things. Yoga is not just the Bhagavad Gita, it is not just the Upanishad. You may call it by any name you like. But you cannot be a comprehensive person because of the weakness of the mind and the incapacity of the understanding to grasp all aspects. You always miss some points, and then you say something is wrong. If you see that point, you will say everything is okay. You have perfect peace, and your peace will spread the aura of peace around you. You become a magnet of completeness—radiating strength, energy and peace. But if you are a partial being, you become wretched yourself and make others around you also wretched.

An ashramite: All right, accepted. But how do I take my pains? Saying that cosmic balance is being set up, that does not help.

Swamiji: Your suffering is due to lack of understanding. It is the philosophy of Madhusudan Saraswati. Have you heard of this him? Madhusudan Saraswati was a great scholar and saint who lived about a hundred or two hundred years ago. He was a master in philosophy. He was also a great devotee of Lord Krishna. He was a jnana yogi and a bhakti yogi. He believed in Krishna only, and in nothing else. Nobody was equal to Madhusudan Saraswati in the philosophy of the Absolute. He is the topmost philosopher of Advaita philosophy—and how he combines it with Krishna's devotion is a wonder. That is the knack of the man; the greatest man is capable of reconciliation of anything with anything.

Visitor: The intellect and heart joined together.

Swamiji: Everything; that is the sign of greatness. He can be reconciled with anything. He is not an irreconcilable personality. That is the sign of greatness. He never refuses anything. He never rejects anything. He does not disbelieve anything. He does not say anything is wrong; that is the sign of greatness. Everything is okay in its proper place, at the proper time, in the given circumstances. So this is, again, yoga.

Ashramite: But, Swamiji, it is said that Lord Krishna's ways, his lilas in his Avatar were all a breaking of social norms, so to speak. And that was said to be a spiritual interpretation, an explanation of God's attitude to man. How can it be a spiritual interpretation?

Swamiji: Because, to say that the Ganga water is very cold is just a human attitude. But God does not say it is very cold, because it is not cold. It is cold only to your skin. To the fish in the Ganga it is not cold. So is Ganga water really cold? Tell me. Now you can very well see that your statement is not correct, for any statement society makes is partial. How can God take it as perfect? You may be right from your skin's point of view in saying that the Ganga water is cold. But the fish in the Ganga does not say it is cold because they have adjusted themselves to the atmosphere. You cannot adjust yourself to it in the same manner. And if the temperature of your body is the same as the temperature outside, you will not say it is winter. So all social laws, personal predilections are judgements made on the basis of the experiences from the point of view of your present state of personality. And it need not be correct. [Emphatically] It cannot be correct. It is partial.

You will not see things as before. If you have got a microscopic eye, you will not see the wall in front of you. You will not see the building, you will see only vibrations, you will see electrons or protons, and if I tell you it is a building, you will not be able to see it. But God has given you a very gross eye and you see a large structure. So, who is correct? Is the microscope correct or are you correct? The circumstances are different, and you speak from different levels of being, whereas God speaks from all comprehensiveness.

Ashramite: What is the ear or the eye with which we should see or hear His lilas so that we understand His purpose?

Swamiji: You first understand your level of existence. Speak from your level only. Do not overestimate yourself and try to see as God sees at the comprehensive level.

Ashramite: You mean to say, what I cannot understand I should leave alone?

Swamiji: You should not try to disturb your present feelings. The disturbance arises on account of the fact that you try to overcome the limits of your feelings. Whether they are right or not is a different matter. They may be right. They are right only as long as they are incapable of transcendence. When they are capable of transcendence, they become wrong. When you are dreaming, the objects that you see in the dream are real but now they are not real—you have transcended them. So when I say it is real or unreal, it depends upon the point of view, the level of being from which I speak. You cannot get over the idea that you are a human being. But it is not true that you are a human being ultimately. You are something else. You are a unit in the Cosmic Force—but you cannot understand it. It is no use talking about it. So what is your present state? You are a human being. You cannot forget that you are an Indian. You cannot forget that you are a woman. All these are false notions, ultimately. But when you realise that you are not a woman, then your law changes and you speak in a different language and you experience different things.

So long as your feelings and your conditions are inseparable from your present level of understanding, you have to follow only that law. That is what Bhagavan Krishna says in the Gita: do not disturb the present state of affairs, nor speak to others from your point of view of God. Their point of view may be quite different; do not disturb that. You have to go stage by stage, from one level to another. All yoga is transcendence, and not negation. You do not negate anything, you transcend it. You should understand the difference between negation and transcendence. You do not negate the nature of a child, but you transcend it when you become an adult. When a child behaves in a particular manner, you do not call it a stupid behaviour. It is a valid behaviour on that level. But if you now behave like a baby, it is invalid because you have transcended it. Work on that level till you transcend it. And when you fulfil the law of that level, you will automatically be liberated from that bondage, which would mean that you have taken to another level. And then you work on that level. Like that, you go higher and higher until you reach the Absolute. You should be a happy person at every level. You must always be friendly, happy, balanced and coordinated with every type of atmosphere—that is your wisdom, the wisdom of life. Never reject, never disagree, never become irreconcilable, and never be intolerant.

Ashramite: It is very difficult to decide at what point one should act. I increase my sufferings which could have been forestalled if I could have had…

Swamiji: That is due to ignorance, and ignorance of law is no excuse. Every law is a kind of system which has a reaction.

Ashramite: Swamiji spoke of intolerance. Now, that is exactly the point I want to know. Up to what point should you tolerate?

Swamiji: No limit to tolerance. Christ also suffered due to his goodness. But you cannot say he did a wrong thing. And you will be taken care of by other forces, which will not let you feel at ease. You think that because you follow a system of perfection you suffer; well, really you will not suffer. It is a mistaken notion. If you follow the law from the level on which you are, then you will not suffer.