Friday, July 25, 2014
Thursday, July 24, 2014
Christmas Message from Swami Chidananda
Christmas Message from Swami Chidananda
When Nicodemus came to Jesus Christ secretly one night He said: “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God.” Nicodemus asked: “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” The great teacher answered; Truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the Kingdom of God.”
Water is a universal cleansing and purifying agent. So it means getting rid of mala (impurity) and having chitta shuddi (purity of mind). You have to emerge as purified being. That is also the symbol behind baptism — a cleansing of and getting rid of all sin and emerging sinless, spotless, pure. Fire is also a universal purifying agent. Our fire ceremony also symbolises thorough burning away of all dross – of all that is impure, of all that is contrary to Divinity – and emerge as pure Spirit. This is why it is a symbol of the same rebirth Jesus referred to.
It is rebirth from passion to purity; and then from material consciousness into a state of spiritual consciousness to emerge as a new being, aware of oneself as connected with the Supreme Universal Soul, as a spiritual being beyond time and space, without birth and death, name and form, ever pure, ever free, ever full, ever Divine. It is a rebirth of your very identity – a dying to the old self and being born into a new identity where you know of yourself only as related to the eternal Being. It is rebirth into the Spirit, plunging once again into Satchidananda.
When you wake up from deep sleep, you wake up into a new reality. Waking up should constitute a rebirth into divine life – a rebirth into total truthfulness. For a spiritual aspirant, there should be a daily rebirth – a leaving behind of all that is dross, gross, undivine — and emerging into a new state of shining purity, spirituality and total divinity. Again and again there should be a rebirth until you become like the pure Cosmic Being, partaking of His total purity, partaking of His glorious Divine nature.
Each daybreak should constitute a call to rebirth. This is the invariable condition for the realisation of Reality. It is a call to each one of you to truthfulness, absolute purity in conduct and character, to a continuous compassion and a reluctance to hurt or harm anything created by God. May we be reborn again and again! May you shine with Divinity! God bless you!
This article is a chapter from the book Daily Swadhyaya:http://www.dlshq.org/religions/calltorebirth.htm.
Sri Swami Sivananda speaks on "You are the Master of your own Destiny"
Sri Swami Sivananda speaks on "You are the Master of your own Destiny"
Sunday, July 13, 2014
Gurudev Sri Swami Sivanandaji Maharaj – A Rare Genius of Spirit
Gurudev Sri Swami Sivanandaji Maharaj – A Rare Genius of Spirit
by Swami Krishnananda
(Spoken on April 25, 1972 during night satsang)
All our loves are really dispersed forms of divine love. You have all come here, rushing to this spot, on account of that tremendous magnetic spiritual influence of Gurudev Sri Swami Sivanandaji Maharaj. The individuals, the personalities that he has prepared, are only vessels which he has charged with his force. Whatever little meaning, significance, worth or any value that you may be in a position to discover in people like us here is all a modicum of the greatness of Swami Sivanandaji Maharaj. Whatever is beautiful here, whatever is good here, whatever is of worth here is his spiritual presence working dynamically even at this moment; otherwise, this ashram cannot run. Human beings cannot run ashrams of this kind, and this ashram is not functioning due to human effort. It works like the flow of the Ganga, perennially flowing due to a presence, and not due to an activity. The ashram exists not due to an activity, but due to a presence. That presence may not be visible, but it matters little whether it is visible or not. It is there.
The running of an ashram of this kind is a miracle in itself. Sadhus and Sannyasins cannot be expected to run huge institutions because they have no personal interest in any kind of organisational activity, and if such persons are to be pushed into activity, a mighty presence should be there behind it. And every sincere observer would have deeply felt that there is some uncanny, unveiled presence in this atmosphere. People who come here to talk, go weeping with joy. It is not because they see something with their physical eyes, but because they see something in their hearts which they themselves cannot explain. You may see nothing with open eyes, but yet you will go as a changed person with a tremendous difference in your feeling. There is no doubt about it. All this is because mighty sages lived here.
This is Rishikesh, Muni-ki-reti, the sands trodden by the mighty Masters, from Vasishtha onwards. Vyasa, Suka, Sri Ramachandra, and others, all these mighty beings moved across this place, and this beautiful, hallowed spot was chosen as the venue of tapasya by Gurudev Sri Swami Sivanandaji Maharaj. The power of his tapasya works this ashram. Wherever there is success of any kind, it is tapas that is working. Interest, enthusiasm, desire alone cannot lead to success. You may be bubbling with enthusiasm, but lacking tapas-shakti. Then there is doubtful success. It may not be there as a certainty.
All success is tapas manifesting itself. It is the tapas of Gurudev Swami Sivanandaji Maharaj that is this ashrama. This is an embodiment of his personality. For twelve years he did vigorous tapas before this ashram ever existed, before we were all here, when this was a jungle infested with wild animals. Not a single building was here, they say. The place was very cold, much colder than it is nowadays. A handful of sadhus were living in Swargashrama on the other side of the Ganges, and Gurudev was there as an ideal tapasvin. He possessed nothing – no money in his hand, no paper to write on, no friends to talk to, and yet he was an inspired God-commissioned soul. And so his life itself was a miracle. A few of the mahatmas who had the opportunity of seeing Swamiji during those days were eyewitnesses of his greatness even then.
Sometimes, on occasion, he humorously told us what tapasya he used to perform. He was known as a very generous-hearted doctor, and sadhus suffered from ailments of various kinds. Diarrhoea, dysentery, and other things are common among sadhus who do not have ghee and milk in their diet. They suffered very much. They had to eat dry bread and dhal without oil, ghee, or milk, and did not even have medicine when they fell sick. There was no hospital here. At such a time a swami came here who was a doctor, and so he was a godsend panacea to these mahatmas, and they used to tell us how kind and good he was.
He never had any money. Those days money had much more value than it does these days. We used to have a share of rice for one anna, perhaps even less. At that time he used to receive a one-rupee money order per month from Hari Ganesh Ambekar, who was known as Swami Hariomanandaji Maharaj. He used to send one rupee per month out of his salary, and with that one rupee Swamiji used to purchase some medicine and some curd. And what would he do with this medicine and curd? He left it silently in the kutirs of sadhus, without making it known that he had kept it for them. Then he would slide away to the sands near the Lakshmanjhula bridge.
He used to stay in a kutir in Swargashrama. Many of you might have seen that kutir. But he could not stay there on account of people troubling him constantly, so after sunset he would go and sit across the bridge on the sands of the Ganga, and there he used to perform his meditations. We never knew what meditations he practised, or what his sadhana was. It was all difficult for us to understand. He was not interested in speaking about these subjects. For twelve years in Swargashrama he lived such a hard, austere, self-controlled life of a serious God-loving, God-inspired sage like this.
A few of us had the thrice-blessed opportunity of coming in actual physical contact with him. What it is to be physically present in the vicinity of a mahatma, only one who has been there can know. It is a wonder. It is a great blessing. We never learned anything from books. We only learned from observing him. He never taught anything to us from scriptures. We had the blessing of living with him for some 22-23 years. It was something wonderful indeed to be able to live with a person of his calibre for so many years. He never taught us anything, as Gurus ordinarily would be expected to open an Upanishad, a Brahma Sutra, and give discourses. Nothing of the kind. Occasionally he would say certain things from which we had to gather meaning. Sometimes these words would come in the form of praise; sometimes he would censure us, criticise us. If we would exhibit too much vairagya, he would call us false vairagis and say, “These fellows think that these processes of throwing off cloth, etc., will bring God to them.” But if we put on a blanket he would say, “This vairagya he is also wearing these days. These people came with great vairagya, but now they want blankets.” His way of teaching was wonderful.
He was a very kind mother to all of us, and his passing has been an indescribable sorrow to every one of us. We are all left now like fatherless children. We are veritably fatherless children, orphans, as it were. When he was there, we had no botheration, no worries, nothing to think about. This ashram was his business. If we had any difficulty, we had only to go to him and tell him what it was. Now where to cry, whom to tell? We have to stand on our own legs, and our legs are aching.
But nevertheless, he has made it clear to us that he is not absent from our midst. We do feel his presence. Otherwise, wherefrom the energy comes to us? We do not eat good food. You all know what food we eat in the ashram. You are all coming from good households, eating good meals. You would not like this food in the ashram, so you want to run away as early as possible from this place. But we have had to eat only this for years and years, and yet work without holidays, without Sundays, without any rest. From where do we get this energy? This roti cannot give this strength, nor can this ashram be said to belong to us. What is the interest, then? The ashram does not belong to us, we have not got good food to eat, we do not get a salary, and we have only problems. People criticise us. There is nobody to praise us; they only find fault with us. Then how is it possible for us to work here? For what do we work? What do we get out of it? Nothing – nothing visible. And yet God has kept us alive, and we are happy and contented persons. What keeps us happy?
I am telling this to you to say that Gurudev is still alive. Otherwise, we would die of sorrow itself; we would perish in three days. We are most unsuited bodies in every respect. We have absolutely no qualification whatsoever to be able to run this ashram because we are all bodies who are worn out, as it were; and yet Gurudev speaks to us in a voice of his own, and the toil of the bodies is rewarded by the satisfaction of the mind.
It is this spirit, this spiritual presence of Sri Gurudev, that has drawn you, that summons you to this place, and all these beauties, grandeurs, miracles that you see in the name of The Divine Life Society are only the miracles of Gurudev Swami Sivanandaji Maharaj. Before him there was no such institution, no such organisation here.
In the battle of the Mahabharata, the Pandava brothers were only a humorous instrument while the power was something invisible – Bhagavan Sri Krishna, who never wanted to proclaim himself. Even after the battle, Bhagavan Sri Krishna came and paid his obeisance to Yudishthira and said, “Rajan, due to your virtue, due to your goodness, due to your tapas, and due to the dexterity of Arjuna, the might of Bhima, you have won victory.” He never said, “I have helped you; I was behind you.”
Similarly, Gurudev used to say, “You are all wonderful pillars, gems, rubies.” That was his goodness. That was also the way in which he was teaching, and it is the way in which he teaches us even today. Therefore, may the glory go to him; may all the credit be accumulated and be surrendered to him. May his blessings be upon us all. May we be true disciples of this great Master, and may we realise that his devotion truly consists in following his footsteps. It is not merely singing his name, taking his name, which is of consequence. The true disciple does not merely take the name of the Master; the true disciple actually lives the life which the Master would expect him to live.
Gurudev has set an example to us of tapas, fire of renunciation. He was a conflagration of virakti. With all the facilities and the comforts that were materially provided to him by well-wishers, patrons and devotees, he remained a fire within. He had no ashram. In his mind there was no ashram, there was no Divine Life Society. It was only for others that the ashram existed, and exists. He came as a fire of virakti, lived as such, and left us as such an example. Therefore, it is our bounden duty to live as his honest disciples, as fires of renunciation. What we lack is renunciation, virakti. We are likely to become lovers of ease. This is what Gurudev would be opposed to.
God in His mercy may shower all abundance upon you. Yes, it is wonderful, but your virakti should not wane. “Well, you are a maharaja of maharajas,” Swamiji used to say, “and yet you are a beggar of beggars at the same time.” “Everything is ours,” Swamiji used to say, “and yet you know what we really are. Nothing.” We own nothing. We brought nothing when we came, we can take nothing with us, and therefore, even now we possess nothing. We are only tools in the hands of divine forces who use us for a higher purpose in the mission, for the glorification of God’s name in this world, and in our case, to immortalise the name and the greatness and glory of Master Swami Sivananda.
If we are to regard ourselves as his followers, his admirers, his disciples, we have, at least in a small percentage, to live the life of virakti that he lived. That is tapas. Tapas and virakti mean one and the same thing. All this ashram is the outcome of his tapas, renunciation. Without tapas, you can achieve nothing. And he was a shining example of what renunciation is. To have everything under one’s command and yet want nothing, that is real virakti. When you possess nothing, you may look like a virakta, but that is not the virakti of Gurudev Sri Swami Sivanandaji Maharaj. When you are in a position of power, you should not exercise it. That would be your greatness. But we are such weaklings that the moment we are placed on a chair, we try to raise our rods against other people. That is also a form of tapas. When you have everything to enjoy, you do not enjoy it. At your word, anything will come to you, but you do not want it. That is virakti. You are in a good social position commanding tremendous authority, but you do not misuse it. That is tapas. If it is possible for you to do some good, you use that power to do good to people. That is tapas. If you speak, you speak only kind words. That is also tapas. Do not speak harsh, pointed, barbed words to any person, not even to a servant. That is tapas. When you can get on with two pieces of cloth, do not ask for three. That is tapas. People may dump on you hundreds of things, but you must be satisfied with the minimum. People may offer you bungalows, but you must be satisfied with one single room because you want only six feet to lie down on the floor. Whatever be your importance, you do not require more than six or seven feet of ground to sleep. Whatever be your greatness, you cannot eat ten mounds of rice or puri in a single day. Your stomach is so small. The beggar’s and the king’s stomach are the same size.
To realise the truth of things and to realise our real position in this world, that is tapas. We do not understand our real position in this world. We always overestimate our position in life. Sometimes also we underestimate it. That is also not proper. We have to properly assess our position in this world. What you can do and what you cannot do, both these you must be able to understand. As a famous Chinese philosopher put it, “Give me the power to change what I can, and the strength to bear what I cannot, as well as the wisdom to know the difference.” If you can change a thing, change it. If you cannot change a thing, well, it is very clear. If you try to change a thing which you cannot change, it is called tension. You unnecessarily create tension by trying to do what you cannot do. So the wisdom is to know the difference between what you can and what you cannot do. When you do not have this wisdom, you suffer in life.
Truly speaking, our position in this life is very humble, very simple, and so pitiable. That we look grand and wonderful is really surprising. In a minute, anything can happen to us. Anything can happen to us anywhere. There can be an astronomical catastrophe, there can be a geological catastrophe, there can be a political catastrophe, there can be a social catastrophe, there can be a physiological catastrophe like thrombosis, paralysis, heart attack, of which we hear so much these days.
What is our importance? Where lies our greatness? Our real greatness lies in realising our humble position in this world. We are just small children in every respect. We can only do the bidding of God and our Guru. It is, therefore, our primary duty not to put forth our vanity at any time or pose what we are not, because any kind of pretention of this sort would be self-deception, hypocrisy, and contrary to spiritual sadhana. A spiritual sadhaka is not an important person. He has no importance at all. All importance is transferred to God. God is his friend, his succour, his power. He will simply cry like a child. What does a child do? It simply cries, whatever be the difficulty, and the father or the mother comes and does what is necessary. The sadhaka is such a simple person.
Swami Sivanandaji Maharaj was really a rare specimen of a genius of spirit in this age, the like of which we cannot easily see. How should we thank God for this gracious, rarest opportunity that He has provided to us to come in actual physical contact with such a mighty Master?
My prayers be to the Almighty that He shower His abundant blessings upon you all for salvation in this very birth. God bless you all!
source : http://www.swami-krishnananda.org/disc/disc_252.html
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| Swami Sivananda Saraswati |
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| Swami Krishnananda Saraswati |
by Swami Krishnananda
(Spoken on April 25, 1972 during night satsang)
All our loves are really dispersed forms of divine love. You have all come here, rushing to this spot, on account of that tremendous magnetic spiritual influence of Gurudev Sri Swami Sivanandaji Maharaj. The individuals, the personalities that he has prepared, are only vessels which he has charged with his force. Whatever little meaning, significance, worth or any value that you may be in a position to discover in people like us here is all a modicum of the greatness of Swami Sivanandaji Maharaj. Whatever is beautiful here, whatever is good here, whatever is of worth here is his spiritual presence working dynamically even at this moment; otherwise, this ashram cannot run. Human beings cannot run ashrams of this kind, and this ashram is not functioning due to human effort. It works like the flow of the Ganga, perennially flowing due to a presence, and not due to an activity. The ashram exists not due to an activity, but due to a presence. That presence may not be visible, but it matters little whether it is visible or not. It is there.
The running of an ashram of this kind is a miracle in itself. Sadhus and Sannyasins cannot be expected to run huge institutions because they have no personal interest in any kind of organisational activity, and if such persons are to be pushed into activity, a mighty presence should be there behind it. And every sincere observer would have deeply felt that there is some uncanny, unveiled presence in this atmosphere. People who come here to talk, go weeping with joy. It is not because they see something with their physical eyes, but because they see something in their hearts which they themselves cannot explain. You may see nothing with open eyes, but yet you will go as a changed person with a tremendous difference in your feeling. There is no doubt about it. All this is because mighty sages lived here.
This is Rishikesh, Muni-ki-reti, the sands trodden by the mighty Masters, from Vasishtha onwards. Vyasa, Suka, Sri Ramachandra, and others, all these mighty beings moved across this place, and this beautiful, hallowed spot was chosen as the venue of tapasya by Gurudev Sri Swami Sivanandaji Maharaj. The power of his tapasya works this ashram. Wherever there is success of any kind, it is tapas that is working. Interest, enthusiasm, desire alone cannot lead to success. You may be bubbling with enthusiasm, but lacking tapas-shakti. Then there is doubtful success. It may not be there as a certainty.
All success is tapas manifesting itself. It is the tapas of Gurudev Swami Sivanandaji Maharaj that is this ashrama. This is an embodiment of his personality. For twelve years he did vigorous tapas before this ashram ever existed, before we were all here, when this was a jungle infested with wild animals. Not a single building was here, they say. The place was very cold, much colder than it is nowadays. A handful of sadhus were living in Swargashrama on the other side of the Ganges, and Gurudev was there as an ideal tapasvin. He possessed nothing – no money in his hand, no paper to write on, no friends to talk to, and yet he was an inspired God-commissioned soul. And so his life itself was a miracle. A few of the mahatmas who had the opportunity of seeing Swamiji during those days were eyewitnesses of his greatness even then.
Sometimes, on occasion, he humorously told us what tapasya he used to perform. He was known as a very generous-hearted doctor, and sadhus suffered from ailments of various kinds. Diarrhoea, dysentery, and other things are common among sadhus who do not have ghee and milk in their diet. They suffered very much. They had to eat dry bread and dhal without oil, ghee, or milk, and did not even have medicine when they fell sick. There was no hospital here. At such a time a swami came here who was a doctor, and so he was a godsend panacea to these mahatmas, and they used to tell us how kind and good he was.
He never had any money. Those days money had much more value than it does these days. We used to have a share of rice for one anna, perhaps even less. At that time he used to receive a one-rupee money order per month from Hari Ganesh Ambekar, who was known as Swami Hariomanandaji Maharaj. He used to send one rupee per month out of his salary, and with that one rupee Swamiji used to purchase some medicine and some curd. And what would he do with this medicine and curd? He left it silently in the kutirs of sadhus, without making it known that he had kept it for them. Then he would slide away to the sands near the Lakshmanjhula bridge.
He used to stay in a kutir in Swargashrama. Many of you might have seen that kutir. But he could not stay there on account of people troubling him constantly, so after sunset he would go and sit across the bridge on the sands of the Ganga, and there he used to perform his meditations. We never knew what meditations he practised, or what his sadhana was. It was all difficult for us to understand. He was not interested in speaking about these subjects. For twelve years in Swargashrama he lived such a hard, austere, self-controlled life of a serious God-loving, God-inspired sage like this.
A few of us had the thrice-blessed opportunity of coming in actual physical contact with him. What it is to be physically present in the vicinity of a mahatma, only one who has been there can know. It is a wonder. It is a great blessing. We never learned anything from books. We only learned from observing him. He never taught anything to us from scriptures. We had the blessing of living with him for some 22-23 years. It was something wonderful indeed to be able to live with a person of his calibre for so many years. He never taught us anything, as Gurus ordinarily would be expected to open an Upanishad, a Brahma Sutra, and give discourses. Nothing of the kind. Occasionally he would say certain things from which we had to gather meaning. Sometimes these words would come in the form of praise; sometimes he would censure us, criticise us. If we would exhibit too much vairagya, he would call us false vairagis and say, “These fellows think that these processes of throwing off cloth, etc., will bring God to them.” But if we put on a blanket he would say, “This vairagya he is also wearing these days. These people came with great vairagya, but now they want blankets.” His way of teaching was wonderful.
He was a very kind mother to all of us, and his passing has been an indescribable sorrow to every one of us. We are all left now like fatherless children. We are veritably fatherless children, orphans, as it were. When he was there, we had no botheration, no worries, nothing to think about. This ashram was his business. If we had any difficulty, we had only to go to him and tell him what it was. Now where to cry, whom to tell? We have to stand on our own legs, and our legs are aching.
But nevertheless, he has made it clear to us that he is not absent from our midst. We do feel his presence. Otherwise, wherefrom the energy comes to us? We do not eat good food. You all know what food we eat in the ashram. You are all coming from good households, eating good meals. You would not like this food in the ashram, so you want to run away as early as possible from this place. But we have had to eat only this for years and years, and yet work without holidays, without Sundays, without any rest. From where do we get this energy? This roti cannot give this strength, nor can this ashram be said to belong to us. What is the interest, then? The ashram does not belong to us, we have not got good food to eat, we do not get a salary, and we have only problems. People criticise us. There is nobody to praise us; they only find fault with us. Then how is it possible for us to work here? For what do we work? What do we get out of it? Nothing – nothing visible. And yet God has kept us alive, and we are happy and contented persons. What keeps us happy?
I am telling this to you to say that Gurudev is still alive. Otherwise, we would die of sorrow itself; we would perish in three days. We are most unsuited bodies in every respect. We have absolutely no qualification whatsoever to be able to run this ashram because we are all bodies who are worn out, as it were; and yet Gurudev speaks to us in a voice of his own, and the toil of the bodies is rewarded by the satisfaction of the mind.
It is this spirit, this spiritual presence of Sri Gurudev, that has drawn you, that summons you to this place, and all these beauties, grandeurs, miracles that you see in the name of The Divine Life Society are only the miracles of Gurudev Swami Sivanandaji Maharaj. Before him there was no such institution, no such organisation here.
In the battle of the Mahabharata, the Pandava brothers were only a humorous instrument while the power was something invisible – Bhagavan Sri Krishna, who never wanted to proclaim himself. Even after the battle, Bhagavan Sri Krishna came and paid his obeisance to Yudishthira and said, “Rajan, due to your virtue, due to your goodness, due to your tapas, and due to the dexterity of Arjuna, the might of Bhima, you have won victory.” He never said, “I have helped you; I was behind you.”
Similarly, Gurudev used to say, “You are all wonderful pillars, gems, rubies.” That was his goodness. That was also the way in which he was teaching, and it is the way in which he teaches us even today. Therefore, may the glory go to him; may all the credit be accumulated and be surrendered to him. May his blessings be upon us all. May we be true disciples of this great Master, and may we realise that his devotion truly consists in following his footsteps. It is not merely singing his name, taking his name, which is of consequence. The true disciple does not merely take the name of the Master; the true disciple actually lives the life which the Master would expect him to live.
Gurudev has set an example to us of tapas, fire of renunciation. He was a conflagration of virakti. With all the facilities and the comforts that were materially provided to him by well-wishers, patrons and devotees, he remained a fire within. He had no ashram. In his mind there was no ashram, there was no Divine Life Society. It was only for others that the ashram existed, and exists. He came as a fire of virakti, lived as such, and left us as such an example. Therefore, it is our bounden duty to live as his honest disciples, as fires of renunciation. What we lack is renunciation, virakti. We are likely to become lovers of ease. This is what Gurudev would be opposed to.
God in His mercy may shower all abundance upon you. Yes, it is wonderful, but your virakti should not wane. “Well, you are a maharaja of maharajas,” Swamiji used to say, “and yet you are a beggar of beggars at the same time.” “Everything is ours,” Swamiji used to say, “and yet you know what we really are. Nothing.” We own nothing. We brought nothing when we came, we can take nothing with us, and therefore, even now we possess nothing. We are only tools in the hands of divine forces who use us for a higher purpose in the mission, for the glorification of God’s name in this world, and in our case, to immortalise the name and the greatness and glory of Master Swami Sivananda.
If we are to regard ourselves as his followers, his admirers, his disciples, we have, at least in a small percentage, to live the life of virakti that he lived. That is tapas. Tapas and virakti mean one and the same thing. All this ashram is the outcome of his tapas, renunciation. Without tapas, you can achieve nothing. And he was a shining example of what renunciation is. To have everything under one’s command and yet want nothing, that is real virakti. When you possess nothing, you may look like a virakta, but that is not the virakti of Gurudev Sri Swami Sivanandaji Maharaj. When you are in a position of power, you should not exercise it. That would be your greatness. But we are such weaklings that the moment we are placed on a chair, we try to raise our rods against other people. That is also a form of tapas. When you have everything to enjoy, you do not enjoy it. At your word, anything will come to you, but you do not want it. That is virakti. You are in a good social position commanding tremendous authority, but you do not misuse it. That is tapas. If it is possible for you to do some good, you use that power to do good to people. That is tapas. If you speak, you speak only kind words. That is also tapas. Do not speak harsh, pointed, barbed words to any person, not even to a servant. That is tapas. When you can get on with two pieces of cloth, do not ask for three. That is tapas. People may dump on you hundreds of things, but you must be satisfied with the minimum. People may offer you bungalows, but you must be satisfied with one single room because you want only six feet to lie down on the floor. Whatever be your importance, you do not require more than six or seven feet of ground to sleep. Whatever be your greatness, you cannot eat ten mounds of rice or puri in a single day. Your stomach is so small. The beggar’s and the king’s stomach are the same size.
To realise the truth of things and to realise our real position in this world, that is tapas. We do not understand our real position in this world. We always overestimate our position in life. Sometimes also we underestimate it. That is also not proper. We have to properly assess our position in this world. What you can do and what you cannot do, both these you must be able to understand. As a famous Chinese philosopher put it, “Give me the power to change what I can, and the strength to bear what I cannot, as well as the wisdom to know the difference.” If you can change a thing, change it. If you cannot change a thing, well, it is very clear. If you try to change a thing which you cannot change, it is called tension. You unnecessarily create tension by trying to do what you cannot do. So the wisdom is to know the difference between what you can and what you cannot do. When you do not have this wisdom, you suffer in life.
Truly speaking, our position in this life is very humble, very simple, and so pitiable. That we look grand and wonderful is really surprising. In a minute, anything can happen to us. Anything can happen to us anywhere. There can be an astronomical catastrophe, there can be a geological catastrophe, there can be a political catastrophe, there can be a social catastrophe, there can be a physiological catastrophe like thrombosis, paralysis, heart attack, of which we hear so much these days.
What is our importance? Where lies our greatness? Our real greatness lies in realising our humble position in this world. We are just small children in every respect. We can only do the bidding of God and our Guru. It is, therefore, our primary duty not to put forth our vanity at any time or pose what we are not, because any kind of pretention of this sort would be self-deception, hypocrisy, and contrary to spiritual sadhana. A spiritual sadhaka is not an important person. He has no importance at all. All importance is transferred to God. God is his friend, his succour, his power. He will simply cry like a child. What does a child do? It simply cries, whatever be the difficulty, and the father or the mother comes and does what is necessary. The sadhaka is such a simple person.
Swami Sivanandaji Maharaj was really a rare specimen of a genius of spirit in this age, the like of which we cannot easily see. How should we thank God for this gracious, rarest opportunity that He has provided to us to come in actual physical contact with such a mighty Master?
My prayers be to the Almighty that He shower His abundant blessings upon you all for salvation in this very birth. God bless you all!
source : http://www.swami-krishnananda.org/disc/disc_252.html
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Necessity of a Guru
Necessity of a Guru
Just as you can give an orange to a man, so also spiritual powers can be transmitted by one to another. This method of transmitting spiritual powers is ‘Sakti Sanchar.’
Birds keep their eggs under their wings. Through heat the eggs are hatched. Even so, spiritual power is transmitted by the Guru to the proper disciple, whom he considers fit for Sakti Sanchar, through touch (Sparshanat) like birds, sight like fish, and thinking or willing (Mananat, Sankalpa) like tortoise.
The transmitter, the Yogi Guru, sometimes enters the astral body of the selected particular student and elevates his mind through his power. The Yogi makes the subject (Chela) sit in front of him and asks him to close his eyes and then transmits his spiritual power. The subject feels the electric current actually passing from Moola-Chakra higher up to the neck and top of the head.
The disciple does various Hatha Yogic Kriyas, Asanas, Pranayamas, Bandhas, Mudras, etc., by himself. The student must not restrain his Ichha Sakti. He must act according to the inner Prerana (inner goading or stirring). The mind is highly elevated. The moment the aspirant closes his eyes, meditation comes by itself. Through Sakti Sanchar Kundalini is awakened by the grace of the Guru in the suitable disciple. Sakti Sanchar comes through Parampara. It is a hidden mystic science. It is handed down from the Guru to the disciple.
The disciple should not rest satisfied with the transmission of power from the Guru. He will have to struggle hard in Sadhana for further perfection and attainments. Lord Jesus through touch transmitted his spiritual power to some of his disciples (master’s touch). Samarth Ram Das touched a prostitute. She entered into Samadhi. Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa touched Swami Vivekananda. Swami Vivekananda had superconscious experience. He struggled hard for seven years more even after the touch for attaining perfection. Lord Krishna touched the blind eyes of Vilvamangal (Surdas). The inner eye of Surdas was opened. He had Bhava Samadhi. Lord Gauranga through his touch produced divine intoxication in many people and converted them to his side. Atheists even danced in ecstasy in the streets by his touch and sang songs of Hari. Glory, glory to such exalted Yogic Gurus! May their blessings be upon us all!!
Sakti Sanchar is of two kinds, viz., lower and higher one. The lower one is a Jada-kriya only, wherein one automatically does Asana, Bandhas and Mudras without any instructions when the Guru imparts the power to the student. The student will have to take up Sravana, Manana, Nididhyasana for perfection. He cannot depend upon the Kriya alone. This Kriya is only an auxiliary. It gives a push to the Sadhaka.
A fully developed Yogi only possesses the highest kind of Sakti-Sanchar.
source : This article is a chapter from the book Yoga And Realisation.
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Sri Swami Sivananda
Just as you can give an orange to a man, so also spiritual powers can be transmitted by one to another. This method of transmitting spiritual powers is ‘Sakti Sanchar.’
Birds keep their eggs under their wings. Through heat the eggs are hatched. Even so, spiritual power is transmitted by the Guru to the proper disciple, whom he considers fit for Sakti Sanchar, through touch (Sparshanat) like birds, sight like fish, and thinking or willing (Mananat, Sankalpa) like tortoise.
The transmitter, the Yogi Guru, sometimes enters the astral body of the selected particular student and elevates his mind through his power. The Yogi makes the subject (Chela) sit in front of him and asks him to close his eyes and then transmits his spiritual power. The subject feels the electric current actually passing from Moola-Chakra higher up to the neck and top of the head.
The disciple does various Hatha Yogic Kriyas, Asanas, Pranayamas, Bandhas, Mudras, etc., by himself. The student must not restrain his Ichha Sakti. He must act according to the inner Prerana (inner goading or stirring). The mind is highly elevated. The moment the aspirant closes his eyes, meditation comes by itself. Through Sakti Sanchar Kundalini is awakened by the grace of the Guru in the suitable disciple. Sakti Sanchar comes through Parampara. It is a hidden mystic science. It is handed down from the Guru to the disciple.
The disciple should not rest satisfied with the transmission of power from the Guru. He will have to struggle hard in Sadhana for further perfection and attainments. Lord Jesus through touch transmitted his spiritual power to some of his disciples (master’s touch). Samarth Ram Das touched a prostitute. She entered into Samadhi. Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa touched Swami Vivekananda. Swami Vivekananda had superconscious experience. He struggled hard for seven years more even after the touch for attaining perfection. Lord Krishna touched the blind eyes of Vilvamangal (Surdas). The inner eye of Surdas was opened. He had Bhava Samadhi. Lord Gauranga through his touch produced divine intoxication in many people and converted them to his side. Atheists even danced in ecstasy in the streets by his touch and sang songs of Hari. Glory, glory to such exalted Yogic Gurus! May their blessings be upon us all!!
Sakti Sanchar is of two kinds, viz., lower and higher one. The lower one is a Jada-kriya only, wherein one automatically does Asana, Bandhas and Mudras without any instructions when the Guru imparts the power to the student. The student will have to take up Sravana, Manana, Nididhyasana for perfection. He cannot depend upon the Kriya alone. This Kriya is only an auxiliary. It gives a push to the Sadhaka.
A fully developed Yogi only possesses the highest kind of Sakti-Sanchar.
source : This article is a chapter from the book Yoga And Realisation.
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