The Nature of the True Religious Life - 2.4. - Swami Krishnananda.

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Wednesday, 13 Sep 2023. 05:30.

Chapter 2: The Religious Ideal of God-realisation - 2.4.

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Therrefore, we can know the importance of awareness. Our being anything would convey no meaning to us if our consciousness were not attached to it. Therefore, the greatest principle and reality of the universe is consciousness. Minus consciousness, everything is a corpse. All our possessions, all our relationships, and all our wealth and glory amount to nothing when consciousness is dissociated from it. To be a king is to be conscious that one is a king. To be rich is to be conscious that one is rich. To be anything is to be conscious that one is that thing. Minus consciousness, nothing is.

Hence, the deep potentiality of the indivisibility of being, into which we are taken in the state of deep sleep, brings us an indivisible happiness. The happiness of sleep is incapable of limitation. If an emperor who rules the whole Earth could not sleep for one year, he would rather sleep and not be an emperor than be an emperor without sleep, because in sleep we go to our own self. In waking and dream we move away from ourselves. There is an aberration of consciousness. In a philosophical style, we may say in waking and dream we move towards the not-self. In sleep we go towards the self.

Now, you will be wondering how such an energy and such a satisfaction can follow from entry into one's own self. The common belief is that happiness is due to the contact of consciousness with an object, and the commonsense view is that the powers and the joys of life are the result of coming in contact with the things of the world. But I say a different thing altogether. The joys of the world are not true joys. They are a sort of make-believe into which we are diverted by a peculiar circumstance in which we get involved. Why do we feel happy when we have a desirable object in our possession? We may be under the impression that the object gives us joy: “I have this possession; I am so happy.” Possession makes us happy. Even the thought of a dear object brings us joy, and when we see the object with our eyes, it brings us greater joy. When the object comes nearer to us, it is a still greater joy. When the object is under our control and possession, it is an indescribable joy. When the object has become part of our nature—we have become one with it, we have absorbed it into our being, it is no more outside us—we go mad with joy. Hence, joy is the union of the subject and the object. The nearer the object comes to us, the greater is our satisfaction in respect of it.

Think over this phenomenon once again. We are happy because we have a consciousness of our having come in union with the object. It is not enough if the object is merely placed on our lap, minus a consciousness of it. There must be an inward organic association with it. The governor of the Reserve Bank of India or the Bank of England cannot be said to be happy because he has millions of rupees or pounds in his hand. He has control over a large sum of currency because he is the governor of a bank, but he is getting a petty salary like anybody else. He has no organic connection with the object on which he is sitting. Hence, mere physical contact with an object cannot bring joy. If we hold the purse of someone else in our hand, it cannot bring us joy. It must be our purse. Another's purse will only bring dissatisfaction, agony and insecurity


Therefore, coming in contact with an object is not enough. There must be a conscious participation in the existence of that object. Again we come to the phenomenon of consciousness. You can imagine how important it is. If your consciousness cannot organically participate in the presence of the object, you will not derive any satisfaction from it. And if the object remains outside you, disconnected from you, you will not be satisfied. There should be an inward relationship between the object desired for and the subjective awareness. As experienced people in this world, you know this very well. There can be a deep dissatisfaction of a few members within the family if there is no inward relationship among them, notwithstanding the fact that one member is only a few inches away from the other. One would not like to speak to the other, and they turn their faces away from each other even if they are physically touching. Hence, physical contact is not enough, and that is not the cause of your joy. It is an entry of consciousness into the object, and the object's participation in the structure of your consciousness, that becomes the source of satisfaction. Then how does it follow that objects in the world bring joy? They do not bring any joy. You are under an illusion.


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To be continued

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