The Heart of Bhagavad Gita

 


season just uh you can calm down a little bit now good okay so now that

you've finished part one to that spiritual dope coming down from your high is now to give you another second dope session

right to get you back into that spiritual high so Swami

switch it off

muscle diva succumbed even comes to vomit and devaki paramon and um krishnam

vande each other

once in America having an American disciple and lady came to Swami the way

country for the first time she records how he looked at her sorrowfully and

said if only you know yourself as you truly are now that's the voice of

Vedanta that's what we're at the saying to us if only we know ourselves as we

truly are the claim is all our problems will be solved once for all once for ever now

Krishna when he starts talking to Arjuna the whole of the Gita has 18 chapters

the first chapter of course being Arjuna's depression yoga but the other


questions by Arjuna in the second chapter krishna teaches whatever he has

to teach in fact the essence of the gita the whole of the gita teachings are there in the second

chapter of the gita and the remaining sixteen chapters which succeed the second chapter are our supplements they

are mostly arise because arjuna asks a question but they are more like explanations of what has already been

taught and what is taught in the second chapter precisely this as I said at Makaha the knowledge of the self the

true self what we really are what we really are as Brahman now in the second

chapter which forms the essence of the Gita there are important verses but it

is the sixteenth verse which we shall concentrate upon this afternoon today in

this retreat in this talk the sixteenth verse of the second chapter that's what

I call the heart of the bhagavad-gita it is truly the philosophical heart of the

bhagavad-gita as we go into it you will see

it seems awfully abstract but yet as we begin to appreciate what is talking

about there's nothing more real than it because it's just talking about reality itself 16 chapter 16 verse of the second

chapter talks about the nature of reality itself it's highly philosophical

yet it founds the basis of all practice that is to follow after that so it's

essential to get a grasp on it now in vedantam the ultimate reality you your

real nature has most famously been described as such chit Ananda such cheap

existence consciousness bliss and after many decades of Vedantic teaching these

words are actually the original Sanskrit words are becoming more common recently in New York I was called to give an

interview on on on one of these internet podcasts in the name of the podcast is cheap heads now the nature of Brahman

can be studied as this in open assured it's talked about as pure existence it

is talked about as pure consciousness often in my talks I use this you know the seer and the seen the drapery sure

many of you are seeing it already on the Kino condition many of the approaches in

Vedanta based on pure consciousness but also on under as bliss now in this verse

which we are going to study Brahman as sucked as pure existence all three are

the same and all of them are you they are all one thing and that's your innate

your inner reality but here in this verse particularly there that means the truth what is real what

what exists of what is existence itself it's called pure existence so we shall

look at that and the verse is based on the on Brahman as such on you as pure being and as pure existence itself what

does it mean what is pure existent means is there is there an impure existence and all those questions and how do we

know ourselves as that all those will come up now let me read out the verse

give you the meaning and then we will go into it the verse goes like this now

settle with Beauty Babu Navaho be dear

Theresa Taha Ohio Rafi - tanta stoner yo

stud - a - Evie what does it mean the

Unreal never comes into existence and the real never goes out of existence

these two the real and the unreal have been properly ascertained by the NORs of

reality let me repeat the unreal never comes into existence and the real never

goes out of existence these two the real and the unreal have been properly ascertained by the

knowers of reality that's what we are aiming to be knowers of reality so what do we have to ascertain we have to

ascertain what is real and what is unreal with regard to the world and regard to ourselves let me set the

context for this verse what has been going on till now just before this how

do we withstand suffering that was that's the discussion which is going on till now and Krishna says you just have

to withstand because suffering is caused by the contact of the senses with the objects heat cold contact of the skin

with the temperature or success or failure contact of the mind with the

heaven of our life insult or praise suffering and pleasure they're caused by our

contact with the world and the reactions within us and these cannot be prevented

the only thing that you can do is you can withstand them with dignity and with serenity I'm again reminded of the

document which I saw about Viktor Frankl he says that what can give us meaning

he's all about finding meaning in life so what can give us meaning he says work can give you meaning you're what what

you do in life that can give you meaning it can love can give you meaning very deeply it can but suppose nothing is

available everything finally dropped sorry you know we are either sick or an

unhappy diseased or dying whatever then

work love although we seem to disappear in life and life becomes said of

unremitting suffering he says suffering ball with serenity and dignity can lend

meaning to life suffering if you bear

the suffering with dignity and serenity that itself can give a kind of deep

spiritual meaning to life these are the locust of meaning is actually not in work or in love it is within yourself

the reality that you are so that's his position now the question arises how do

we bear suffering how do we go through life its ups and downs its vicissitudes

with serenity on what basis where does one stand what is permanent what is real what is what

will not betray us this is the answer in this context krishna teaches this 16th

verse of the second chapter there is a reality which never disappears in

contrast to that everything else in the world is unreal it really never comes into existence

these two should be understood simple enough to sound it sounds very cool but

when we actually investigate it depths are profound and Shankaracharya writes one to three pages of closely

written dense commentary in sanskrit which i intend to take us through in

today's class in this talk before we go into it what is going to happen from now

till the end of this session is one thought ourselves you as pure existence

it's just that one truth and we will try to understand it so because if sustained in a single thought it's like one single

argument we must understand it and you must see it actually learn to look at it

and see that yes it is so and how it helps us will see towards the end and in

the next talk tomorrow in the morning but first of all this one is the core of the entire retreat so please follow

carefully attend I will introduce the

the central thinking of the first and then we will go into the comentary I

will read from the original Sanskrit don't worry about the Sanskrit even if you don't understand one word of Sanskrit it's more for my ease of

thinking I'm using it as a support and for you it's nice to listen to the sound

of the original Sanskrit all you need to know is is the simple English which will

follow after the Sanskrit all right so now let's take up two concepts first

effects and causes you see for example

this this table this lectern is made of wood now one way of speaking about it is

I just said the lectern is made of wood a more philosophical way of speaking about it would be the lectern is an

effect of which the wood is the material cause wood is basically what I'm saying

is the wood is the material out of which this lectern is made now the point to be

understood here is that the lectern has no existence apart from the wood if you

took all the wood out of this it would disappear all the waves in the ocean

just there the Pacific they're in on the waterfront they're all the waves they

are effects whose cause is material causes watery it's basically water which is appearing

as the waves now so just keep this in

mind effect and cause one kind of causes of material cost the substance out of which the effect is made and the effect

has no existence apart from its material so if it's just made of wood this lectern has no existence apart from the

wood if a gold ornament is just made of gold the ornament has no existence apart from the Constituent Gold and the waves

in the ocean they're all made of water so though they do they look different and they do different things a tsunami

wave does one thing the surf on the top of the wave does something else and so on but they all made of water and they

have no existence apart from the water which constitutes the waves so the effects are knowing existence apart from

the constituting material now based on this I would like to make a an interesting point

things have essential or intrinsic properties and incidental or accidental

profitless properties which are sometimes they're sometimes not there those are incident extrinsic accident

and there is something that's essential to it which is there which the thing

retains as long as the thing exists that may sound very vague a simple example will make matters clearer

suppose you are boiling a potato boiling a potato and to the touch the potato

will appear to be a hot potato because it's being boiled but if I ask you the

heat of the potato is it intrinsic to the put is it always a hot potato no it's not it was in the refrigerator just

very cold now because it's in the boiling water it's hot where did it get

its heat from with the heat does not belong to it it was not there earlier it came that heat has been borrowed by the

potato so to speak from the boiling water right so the heat is not intrinsic

or essential to the potato it's a borrowed property okay and accidentally incident to borrowed let's

use the word borrowed property the sign of a borrowed property is it comes and goes

just like borrowed money somebody said Swami today you cannot make out who's

rich and was not rich they're all living on credit so they may have all the fancy

things but you not may not be very rich at all so it's borrowed wealth in the

same way a borrowed property but one way you can trace it it's about properties at one time it was not there and a time

will come it might will be lost just like borrowed wealth it comes and it goes that potato which was not hot now

it's hot later on when you serve it and keep it out on the dining table it'll again become cool after some time showing the

heat was borrowed from what from the boiling water now is the water inherently hot is it borrowed or is it

intrinsic to the water it is borrowed because it was cool but when you put it on the sauce

when you lit the stove the the the electric range bit beneath it it became

hot now it became a started boiling it will again become cool after some times

so it loses the heat it gained the heat and he lost it where did it borrow it from you say the

hots this saucepan it's a saucepan intrinsically hot no it

also got its heat from the stove where the fire was so the fire give lent its

heat to the saucepan and the saucepan length its heat to the water and the water to this potato all of this the

potato this water and the saucepan have all borrowed heat from the fire now is

the fire intrinsically hot yes as long as the fire last common sense as long as

it lasts it's hot heat is an intrinsic property of fire why because is never a

time when fire was cold and there never will be a time when fire and the planet will lose its heat it did not it was not

that fire was cold and it borrowed heat from some time and now it's hot again it would become cold after some time no as

long as the fire remains it will be hot showing thereby heat is an intrinsic

property not a borrowed property of fire I read in a newspaper once in Siberia that heavy snowstorms and the plane got

stuck you know and the people had to come and they act actually asked the passengers to get down and push the

plane the newspapers and then finally they have to apply some kind of heat and

it melted the thing so the snow is terribly cold but even in Siberia the heat was the fire was hot because it was

able to melt the snow so fire is intrinsic heat because it does not lose

that heat neither gains it so what you may ask now let me put this question to

you use this example heat is the property and the potato and the water

and the saucepan in the fire are the things which have heat some of them have borrowed it some of them have

the fire has it intrinsically suppose a thing has existence as its intrinsic

property suppose the thing as existence existence itself being suppose something

has being as a borrowed property what will happen to that thing remember borrowed properties come and go

so if something is borrowed existence from something else then then what will

happen to it if you lose exist it lose the property whatever is borrowed is

lost if something loses existence what will happen it will it will perish it

will die it you go out of existence if something gains existence what happens to it it's born it comes into existence

it's created you say it's produced it's created it's barn so gaining existence

means birth or creation or production losing existence means death or destruction or punishing anything which

is born and it exists and it again dies has borrowed existence it does not have

existence of its own in fact when you look around the world everything is like

that just about everything including our own bodies including our own thoughts they come into being and then they

disappear they born they seem to exist for some time and then they disappear you see think about anything here

they're just permanently they know everything is born exists and disappears showing thereby in terms of the

discussion we are having all the things in this universe must have borrowed existence must have borrowed existence

in terms of cause and effect which we just spoke about they are all effects

because effects borrow their existence from the cause just like the table has borrowed its existence from the wood the

water in the waves in the ocean have borrowed their existence from the constituting water the ornaments made of

gold have borrowed their existence from thee the gold so causes borrow that

existence from the effect effects Barbaro's an existence from the cost the effects borrowed their

existence from the cars because then you would see all the effects they come into

being the seem to be and then they disappear back again the waves come into being the seem to be under the disappear

back again everything all effects they're born of their causes they exist

in their causes and they disappear back into the cut that bears repetition all things are born from causes exist in

their causes and disappeared back into the causes and we are allowed to speak like this because they derive existence

from their causes if something does not

borrow existence but inherently intrinsically by its very own nature has

existence like fire has existence a fire has it inherently if something is

existence inherently intrinsically what will happen to it it will yes it will

always exist it will always exist it will never gain existence or lose

existence it will never come into existence by gaining existence it will never die by losing existence because

its inherent nature is existence so make this difference it's one point the

second point is again back to causes and effects think of a pot a clay pot when

you examine a clay pot when you see the top of it you see it's clay when you see the bottom of it you see is clay when

you see outside it's clay when you see inside it's clay in fact in a clay pot you will not find anything except clay

is that true inside outside nothing except if you made a clay pot yesterday you I mean am

I mean for practical purposes you make nor the rate of the water which went into making that we and all that but

when you weigh the clay pot it's the rate of the clay when you touch the clay pot it's the clay you are touching so

when you touch this what do I say touch wood - lectern recognizing thereby all of it

is just wood all of this the point I'm making here is the effect has no

existence outside its cause there is no part other than the claim there is no

pot independent of the claim when you look at a clay pot it is not that there

are two things clay and pot if you say there's clay and pot I say I'll take the

clay show me the pot you cannot there is no steel second thing apart from the

clay in a clay pot in terms of all effects and causes you say that the

effect is not a real thing apart from the the cause the effect is not a real

thing apart from the cause effect is not a second thing apart from the cause you cannot count two things in a clay pot

can you count here is one thing clay and here's another thing but one and two you

cannot you cannot once you count the clay you have counted everything right

so the effect is not a second real thing apart from the cause so we have made two

points here effects have no inherent existence their existence depends on the

cause in adroit ignite language in the language of non-dualism

the effect because is called real and the effect is called an appearance the

reality reality is the clay and the pot is an appearance thereof are you with me

so far it is the clay alone with a new shape and a name and a function which you call a pot it is the water alone

with a new shape and the name and a function which you call a wave or surf or bubbles or a tsunami wave isn't that

sure there are no two things they are really speaking it's water really speaking this is wood really speaking

the ornament which your gold ornament which you're wearing is gold really speaking when you say the word really speaking because that's what you're

counting without that without the no part you cannot count it without the

wood no lectern that's one conclusion we come to without

the cause no effect that effect is not a second thing apart from because in pedantic language cause real effect

appearance another name for appearance faults other than the sanskrit name for

false medium the sanskrit name for real Satyam effect cause Satyam effect medium

what they are trying to bill going on to prove is brahma satyam brahman or such

alone is real and the world which is an effect of this is an appearance of this

self I'll repeat what we are going to show is the ultimate reality the only

reality is pure being and everything else in this universe appears to exist they are all effects of that pure being

apparent effects it seemed to exist but apart from pure being nothing does exist actually that's what we'll try to prove

that's one point and the second point is the effects always are they born they

exist and they disappear they do not have inherent existence they keep disappearing they keep coming into existence and disappearing that which

continuously exists is the ultimate cause pure being which continuously goes on because it has existence as its

inherent nature let me sound awfully abstract but that's nothing compared to what's going to

happen now we have not even started this shop with Shankar Acharya now with this background we're going to start with Shankar

Acharya remember the context is nothing very abstract the context is how do I

withstand suffering in my life how do I live my life the ups and downs of life

with serenity and calmness what will give me that peace that strength what is the permanence within me like

that cancer patient asked is there something within me which the cancer has

not touched can I find something that the world cannot disturb or destroy

that's what we're trying to seek okay now for the purposes of this talk the

entire thing that will follow the Shankaracharya we just go straight to the master what he's going to say I have

condensed it into seven points already you have the materials with which to work you've already got defines now

we'll just we'll just based on what we just said we will go ahead I'll read the

sanskrit translate for you and discuss for a while and go on to the next point he says that is Shankar actually

commenting on the sixteenth verse of the second chapter he says no he she

torsional elisa korenne on promoting in european our numbers to sympathy all the

experiences of our life cold and heat and success and failure and plays and

insult and health and disease none of these when you examine them can be taken

as really existing why not why not keep

in the background what I said about effects and causes he says we Caro he's up because they are all effects you

begin to see the link between what I am saying and what's happening now he says they are all insects we ask what do you

mean they are all effects become knowledge of immaturity your target are do some stardom Jacques Shushan utopium

Arnim with Beauty rake in anupalabdhi ascent Tata servo because of karna the

TV a canonical update a son he says here all effects are subject to appearance

and disappearance look at look at just

like he says look at a pot a clay pot example which we used you cannot

ascertain its existence apart from the Constituent of clay he says chuck

Shushan European madam look at it touch it what whatever you are seeing whatever

you are touching with Beauty rake and this is other than clay what else is

there what else are you looking at when you look at this are you at the table or electron or the wood

selector you're not looking at the wood what is what is your eye the light is

reflecting of something and coming together what is the light reflecting off a lectern or the wood the wood

actually somebody might say no both electron and the wood really both can

you show them separately you cannot then why are you justified in using the word both literally it's an illusion created

by language and use it that it's only wood here

nothing it's just not one little bit else there is no thing called the table

or lectern apart from the wood similarly he said this is examine a clay pot there

is nothing there except the clay with beauty Reina Anoop elliptic you do not see anything you do not perceive

anything there except the clay and Assad he says that is what I call false and

appearance it's an illusion created by the name and the form by language and our perception

there is a thing called a pot you see but Swami there is a part I can show you

a part if you want you can only show me the material out of which the part is made it looks like a pot it talks like a

pot and behaves like a pot and does pot like things but in a sense it's only the material it might be a brass part or a

clay pot it's just a thing the constituent constituent material so what

what do I have to do with clay and parts and so on he says servo we got a car on

a beauty radar Hoople updated everything in this universe what you experience there are all effects and they do not

exist apart from the Constituent causes the Buddhists put it nicely if I show

you this what is this you'll see it's a fist but if I open this where is the

fist now the Buddhist says the fist is nothing but an EV a particular

arrangement of the constituent fingers rearrange the fingers I have not removed

a single think the pistol disappeared there is no such thing as a fist

other than the fingers which you have arranged in a particular arrangement said okay so what even the fingers

themselves they are particularly arrangements of cells and tissues right

apart from that is no such thing as a finger and tissues themselves of cells

and cells themselves of subcellular structures and so on therefore nothing

in the world is as it seems to be they are all nothing apart from their

constituent causes there is no effect apart from the Constituent cause in in

Vedantic language the cause is real the effect is false but every cause has

its own cause also like the fist has its cause the five fingers arranged in a

particular way but each finger also has its cause there are tissues inside and the tissues have their cause to the

cells inside and so harm down and down and down are we going to end up with

nothing though the world appears we'll see so that's one point the point which

we have already made effects have no existence apart from the cause and such a situation you're calling the cause

real effect false and everything in the world is an effect false means in

sanskrit mithya so what they are saying is jagat mithya the universe is an

appearance why is the universe an appearance because everything that you take up in the universe is made of a

cause and apart from the car it's not there you see okay the cause exists no that causes its cause - you see this

we're talking about a stable this lecture you're saying the lectern has no existence apart from the wood okay but

the wood also has no existence apart from the earth element constituting it the earth element is also no existence

apart if you believe in model if you are in in modern physics we go down that way the constituent atoms the constituent

atoms have no existence apart from the constituents of nu sub nu subatomic particles and down even go further down

the quarks the super strings further and further down the higher structures have

Millie distance apart from their underlying causes this is what is meant by in in Vedanta as jagat mithya it seems to be a

real thing but when you examine it it has no existence apart from its underlying cause and the underlying

causes no existence from its underlying cause and so on one point second point

already we have done this Genma prog drunks are damn proud of drunken collapsing none of these effects

are are available or seen before their creation and after their destruction

remember borrowed existence means that it later it will come into existence and

will disappear out of existence borrowed heat it becomes hot then cool stuff he borrowed belt become rich and then you

lose your wealth borrowed existence means it comes into existence and disappears out of existence it's born

and it dies if it's born and it dies it means they do not have intrinsic

existence are you with me so far anything that has intrinsic existence

will neither be born nor belly time all things in the world are born and the

time mountains and it lands and our own bodies our thoughts and ideas and

memories everything comes into existence and disappears some in a fraction of a second seconds some in millions of years

Rabindranath Tagore in his Boniface Gitanjali poems he says when a leaf

drops away from a dry leaf drops from a tree and falls into a pond it sets into

motion ripples faint ripples it is the same ripples which are moving out among

the stars and galaxies multiples of change and destruction update so all

things come to an end anything that becomes G artists here he drove over to

the Vita says that which is born that is certain of that death is certain of that which is part

in our philosophy can discussion what does it mean it means then in that case those things do not have intrinsic

existence they are only borrowed existence because they came into existence and they disappear and we see

all of these effects they are borrowed existence because they come into existence and they disappear in which

case they are in our language not real they are appearances of some underlying

reality second point now doubt

distillation karate are your eyes he will pose a question a question which may is already coming in our mind when I

talk about the fist being nothing but the fingers and the fingers being nothing but the tissues and the tissues

being nothing but the cells the cells being nothing but subcellular structures and so on down to from biology to

chemistry to to physics and some nuclear physics are we going is the whole

universe is going to disappear into nothingness smaller and smaller and

smaller into nothing is nothing that exists and nothing that has in our language inherent existence is all of it

borrowed existence but we know from economics and from everything else that everybody cannot borrow there must be

somebody who was the initial lender somewhere that you got the bank it may be the Federal Bank of something

somewhere like fire is the one which lent its heat to the saucepan to the to

the water to the potato they all borrowed it but it started with the fire in the universe does nothing have

inherent existence all things are nothing just have appearances that's the question he has asks if

everything has a cause you're saying that that which has a cause is not really there effects are not really

there the causes are real but the causes also have their own cause so in that case there's an endless chain and everything the universe has no real

existence so it all disappears into blankness that's the question without economist your car on a

stretcher that Carnaby Theory cannot open up the a septum da da suddenly just serve up how a person going to change he

says part has no real existence it's the clay which is existence but the clay has

no real existence its cause the earth element has existed but our tellement has no real existence it's causes it and

so on if you go on and on and on everything becomes an appearance and

then he says sir above our then then nothing really exists is that what

you're trying to say now we go into the third point Shankar Acharya makes a very

important distinction here this is where he actually points out Brahman in our

own existence right now that you are experiencing Brahman let's see he says

no no sir what trouble did they open up they said put the assembled et Jade let

me explain this every experience that we have Shankracharya makes a very

important point here every experience we have of the world everywhere actually

has two aspects we look at only one aspect and you continuously miss the

other aspect but we are experiencing two aspects in every experience what are the

two what are the two aspects of every experience experience of name-and-form experience of existence look at this

when I look out here I see man is man

exists the house is and they look

outside the city is the ocean everything

that we experience we experience as existing right when you look at your

neighbor you look at your neighbor you don't only see a person you see the person existing it's so logical and it's

so natural that you never even think about it but Shankar Acharya says it

look at your experiences all your experiences have a dual aspect one is of

a name and form of something and the other one is they exist that's something if the being of that

something it's a very subtle point but we're very simple of every HP just look

around what happens to us is we take this for granted because it's sort of

boring and never changes and this is interesting it changes all the time and

so we look at this and this becomes our life samsara what is your life there are men and

women and there's money and there is there are houses and cars and there is happiness and misery and there are

things to do all of this samsara this is samsara but underlying

all of that is this is now he points out

this experienced man woman fan house city ocean whatever you're experiencing

this is subject to change this is subject to change continuously changing

but the existence of these things never changes if you consider it separately

from the thing itself there is a sense of being consider it this way a mirror

if I hold up a mirror here it will show me many things if you show me the people

and the chairs and the books there and this hall and after sometime it will show me the hall is empty and the people

are gone and the chairs may be removed all of that is appearing in the glass which is the mirror what is constant in

all of this the mirror itself the glass itself and in fact I will say in the

mirror the only reality is the mirror everything else is an appearance in that class in the same way consider the

isness the pure being to be the mirror in which the universe appears so try to

wrap your mind around it wadn't is telling you you are that isness you are

that isness with all of these this entire universe has no

independent existence apart from you the pure business it is your being which is

borrowed everything here in the what you experience has borrowed experience everything in the mirror has borrowed

its experience in the render talking about things outside I'm talking about the reflections in the mirror every

reflection in the mirror has borrowed its existence from the mirror everything

that you experience in the world you experience as existing and yet

where is this being what is this being it on tree insists that it's you you are

the being which from which is borrowed the existence of everything you may have

many questions noting that what do you mean suppose I die suppose that time

everything that goes on existing how can it borrow my existence from me but then

you immediately see the fallacy of this question when I die what do I mean when I die when I die the body dies this

particular body dies I'm not saying that you are the body I'm saying you are the beam the existence very business of this

universal so Shankaracharya points out here sarvatra 3d survey you pull up

deity semana de colony in every experience everybody experiences two

things a changing object of experience and an unchanging business and Vedanta

says that unchanging business is your real nature it's like let's take the

example of the wave and the water when you go out on the waterfront there in San Diego and on the front of waterfront

ocean there you see thousands of waves in the Pacific Ocean and imagine now a little wave which is born out there in

the distance in the Pacific Ocean and it's created remember it's an effect what's the cause water it comes up as a

believable wave and the little vein is happy it's a other thing he needs to play with and it's fun and being away

when is rushing around on the surface of the precaution it's fun being away but then

soon problems appear how that other wave is mean to me this wave is nice it's

it's some friendly to me some are my friends and someone not so nice to me and look at that wave wow it's a tsunami

wave and such a loser compared to it it's so big and then other wave it's a

bubble it's just a loser I'm compared to me I'm much better than envied contempt likes and dislikes all

of these crop up and this is all born of separation from each other not only that

the real problem of being a wave comes up what's that somebody next to it another wave says that San Diego what's

happening there you're just going to go there and die hit San Diego when you die die yes

that's what happens the destiny of all lives we reach the shore and we died oh my god I don't want to die death birth

and death and difference and envy and content and friendship and enmity all of

some sort of the wave some solid becomes its problem now Vedanta cleave comes along next to it

and says look look you are not really a

wave the reality in you is something called water it's within you it's on top

of you it's everywhere around you and all of us are that water and that that little wave things waste water I mean I

can see I'm a baby his are under way even though these are waves and surf and bubbles but where is this water and

finally it begins to realize what is meant by water once it realizes what water is says oh I am water appearing as

a wave oh this great and then what happens all these other guys there are

also water and they are me because once I realized myself as water I am not

limited to this particular wave and all of them and the entire ocean in fact all

the waves depend on the water the entire ocean depends on the water it's the water which appears as the ocean and all the little

veins and all of them how can I be contemptuous of bubbles because it's me

I am water coming as little bubble why do I have to be jealous of the tsunami wave it's me it's me as water and all of

this not only that when I go and finally dash against San Diego I'm not dead the

wave form disappears I'd become spraying what fun I'd become bubbles and I might become water vapor rising up into the

sky by the sunlight and so on let's not extend that example any further but but

you see the moment the wave realizes itself as water in one sense all of its

problems are solved though it continued the wave still continues being 11 will go on up to such certain distance it'll

be just a wave but it realizes itself as one with everything else now this pure existence what when Arthur

says you shift your identification into the isness within you everything can be

stripped away from us wealth power people help youth memory is there

something that is not touched I still am in spite of all of this

I am the isness which appeared as a young person I am the isness which is

appearing as an old person now you say no Sam it's still nicer to be a young

person but you are the isness in all of the young person's and all of the old

persons and all the non persons and the animals and birds and all of that the one isness you to try to shift your

awareness to that that's what Shankar Acharya is speaking about here he says Taotao Hollywood diva

charity sahaja - it am not to suck booty among these experiences all the time

the experience of these objects keeps on changing but the experience of business

does not change so there must be something in us corresponding to that experience of

isness which does not change I am the one unchanging sucked infinite existence

that's what's meant by infinite it's not cut off by time it does not begin or end because this pure existence is inherent

existence is not borrowed from anything else everything else borrows existence from this inherent existence

I remember this Swami who was teaching a spade on thin the Himalayas he had an operation in the stomach is quite old

and after the operation he came up and then he was sitting for the class the first time he came for the class and we

were other Swami's sitting around his feet it was in heart door at the foothills of the Himalayas and the

moment he sat down he was bare bodied we could see his whole body was covered in a sheen of sweat so there's some pain

inside and somebody has said so Ani you don't have to take the class you don't have to give a class now you can go and

rest and then the Swami told a story he said look long ago in a village there

was this old woman who lived by herself and she had a little vegetable patch which she cultivated and there were

birds which would come and try to eat the vegetables and she would bang a tin box to scare the birds away

one day a camel came there an old camel came there and started eating the

vegetables the woman rushed out and banged the tin in front of the camel and the camel of course it could speak so

the camel said woman I in my time I was

a warm camel in Rajasthan and all you see there camels were used for what I mean in medieval times even now I think

the army has a camel corps so I was a war camel and big drums were beaten on

my back you know so this I was used to a tremendous amount of noise do you think I'm going to be afraid of your little

little tin box and then the Swami said I am that existence on whose back

universes are created and universes are dissolved am I going to be upset by

little stomachache no we will have the class and so even Tom this is this transition I'll talk

more about it later this is the third point I wanted to make

now the fourth point right some of all of these later on an interesting effect

the reality existence is not a part of this universe or part of this objects

what do I mean by that if you look at this table I look at a conventional

table it has a top and four legs right if you say what are the parts of the table if you say the parts are well one

it has a top two three four five it has four legs so it is five parts four legs

and a top this is a bare minimum of a table and if you nod no no no this one

more thing the wood which constitutes the table that's the sixth part of the table there are the four legs and the

top and the wood is that a correct way of thinking no no it is not why why is

it not because all the parts you just mentioned they are all made of the wood the wood is not another part of a table

right so in the same way this pure existence is not a part of this universe

it's the reality in which the universe with all its parts appears it's not what

why this important is it's not that if you ask Who am I it's not that I'm a body I'm a mind and

maybe now this one is talking about a pure existence I have a third thing called a pure existence no pure

existence is not a part of a system which you are you are the pure existence in which the body mind and the universe

appear a good way of understanding this is a dream when we go fall asleep and

start dreaming in our dream thousands of things are there there are people there

are animal there are things which are some things are good some things are bad and so on there's a whole drama which is

happening are the thousands and millions of things in the dream people have animals and things in the dream is the

dreamer up one of those things the dreamer may have a body in the dream a dream body and playing a dream role but

the real dreamer who is lying on the bed and sleeping is he or she part of the dream know he or she is a reality which

is projecting that dream in the same way we are this pure existence which is

projecting the dream of this universe within ourselves you may think this is

too abstract to become real it's not just the other way around this is the

reality in which the whole universe is an abstraction what without this thing

is you are this already and there are actually practical methods which are useful for appreciating this we shall

see in the guided meditation today in the evening how these are converted this

whole philosophy is converted into a system of meditation which enables us to dwell on the pure isness within

ourselves so it says pure existence is

not a part of of what you are it's the reality and it's that which lends

reality to the entire universe with all its constituent parts so it's the background reality of everything now a

quick exchange takes place somebody asks a question got a nasty cut about them

every guarantee on Sunday of every charity teach aid question just a minute

if I smash the pot your your favorite pot so not only is the part broken but

the existence of the part is also gone now you see the part does not exist and then Shankar Acharya says nah but nada

will be said Butley darshan out he says but no the part may be broke broken but

the existence continues in the table you see if the table exists the person exists the man exists the woman existed

shared so existence continues in other things which are not broken and even when the part is broken what do you have

pot sherds broken pieces apart what will you say the broken as a part exist existence consist the

form has changed when you destroy something the name and the form changes

existence is not lost existence continues now he asks a really deep

question now we are going into the fifth point a really deep question suppose you

see the question which we come to our mind says look all this sounds very

abstract I know that things exist here our people here are chairs and tables

things exist but you keep talking about existence itself isn't that a play on

words isn't that something maybe at best a philosophical abstraction is it really

real what really seems to be real to us are things things exist here's a world

of things here is a body I can even say here's a mind I experience a mind and feelings but the existence of all of

this can you really separately speak of existence apart from the things Vedanta

does the opposite you analysis look how deluded we are here like we are asking

there are tables made of wood there are chairs made of wood there are dishes and

cups and plates and maybe a fan and everything made of wood but if there really something called wood itself what

a foolish thing to ask with Arthur says just the other way round why not this is wood alone is the

reality you may just as well you can actually better ask whether there's really something called a table really

something called a chair really something called a fan or something with made of wood apart from the Constituent

wood that's how we long to looks at it the wood is the thing which exists and

it appears in all these ways existence alone is the thing which exists and it appears in various names and forms now

the question which is put here is suppose all things are destroyed in the

universe Kosmic just destruction big crunch in the Hindu mythology it's called in Hindu

cosmology to scald pralaya pralaya means dissolution of the universe so nothing

exists no thing exists anymore now when no thing exists are you

justified in talking about pure existence continuing somehow do you see

it's a very subtle question he says somebody Rapinoe sh t hurt another

shitty alright you say that when a part is broken the table exists in the chair

exists but the existence of that thought which was there earlier that existence is gone so existence can go out of

existence you can't say that existence is immutable here's a very subtle answer

the subtle answer is here Shankar Acharya says no existence does not

disappear it's only the perceptibility they experience ability of the existence

that goes out when the name and form is not available anymore I'll repeat when

the name and form is not available anymore when there is no thing to see touch me here think about then you

cannot appreciate existence in itself all things need existence to exist to

only need pure existence for their own existence but pure existence also needs

these things to be experienceable how do you experience water you experience

water in a glass in a bowl in the ocean in as water vapor in various names and forms if no names and forms are there

it's very difficult to conceive of water nameless formless in itself and that's

just for water imagine for pure existence so what happens is without

names and forms it becomes inconceivable it becomes in experienceable but it continues to exist it continues

to exist it's a bit like this place is full of light suppose I put my hand here

you can see light shining from my hand you can see that I remove it this seems

to be empty space here but isn't it full of light you see if I put my hand here and ask you what

are you seeing you say hand but I'm saying that you are also seeing the light reflected of the hand when you remove the hand you don't it not you

neither see the hand but you don't see the lighter thing in which is here in this space similarly pure existence it lends itself

so that the universe can exist but also the universe makes pure existence

experienceable do you see the beauty of the little story which I told earlier when God wanted to play there's nobody

else God could play with now because only God exists Brahman only exists pure

existence the only thing that exists now God did something very clever God

pretended not to be God God pretended to be you and me and him and her pure

existence in order to experience itself took on the garb of name-and-form

man exists woman exists a fan exists a house exists the isness now appears as

an existing universe all of it at its heart is nothing but pure being just

names and forms right without these names and forms you cannot experience

Brahman pure being but with these names and forms you have a wealth of a universe you know what the

problem is the problem is we see man woman child house mortgages and all

sorts of things in the world we do not see the existence behind it when you

focus on the always available never absent pure existence suck in all of

your experiences you are focusing on Brahman you're focusing on God itself it

is this sucked pure existence if it's too difficult to wrap your mind around Vedanta says conceive of it as God the

god of religion okay what is God like well call it vision it has four arms and

like this and that and give it a form then I don't believe in not this form okay it has no farm it has wonderful

qualities and you can pray to this the

bhakti approach this is how dualistic religion comes out of non-dualism all

right so here it says with names and forms pure existence becomes the

existence of things without names and forms pure existence you pure being you continue to exist but you're not you

cannot experience yourself then this is the fifth point then the sixth point I

want to make is here okay

a very interesting question is asked you are saying real and the faults are

existing together how is this possible saying that this sucked your existence

alone is really real and everything else is an appearance how can the false and

the real coexist together it's a logical problem that which is and that which is

not how can they be together it seems to be a logical a little bit of problem

question is asked either mood and answer

is either mudokon Itamaraty are you a neuter of Nadia P semana recurrent neo-traditional he says no there's

nothing no problem with this we always experience it in the case of illusions for example when you say when you see

water in a mirage you see water in a mirage actually it's just sand and hot

air there there's no water but in your experience you are experiencing two things we the ground of that experience

though you don't recognize it and the illusory water the water which is not

there and the desert which is there both are experienced together one which is

real one which is an appearance when you see a snake in a rope the classic

vedantic example only one of them really exists and the other one does not is there is no snake there it just a rope

mistaken for a snake two things exist together a false snake and a temporarily real rope yeah

we'll ultimately it's all Brahman right a blue sky the sky is their space it's

not really blue it's a scattering of light which makes it look blue but you can see the blue even after you

understand that understand basic school optics and look up there you still see a blue sky especially in San Diego you see

the blue sky sky and the blueness which is not really there are seen together

exactly like that Vedanta claims is in entire universe you

the pure existence are the only thing that really exists and in you appears

the name and forms of this vast universe you are immortal the body mid-time the

mind is continuously dying thoughts are coming and going but you the pure existence which is also

consciousness it continues unchanged and undiminished by the ages the ages rolled by over you

you are not a tiny spark of existence in a vast and uncaring universe in fact this vast and uncaring universe is tiny

compared to you it appears in you this infinite ocean of existence will see

more in the meditation session later on today then he makes a comment here

they're coming to the seventh point because you the pure existence alone are

real everything else borrows its reality for you then the smart they are did

wonders just as a corona see except on a videotape hahaha therefore body mind and universe none of

them are real because they borrow their existence from you you alone are real because you have inherent existence

intrinsic existence your own natural existence you are such pure existence

are you making a claim here know what Shankar Acharya is saying is a

the experience reveals this to us continuously you have never experienced

your creation not have you ever experienced of destruction one of our monks who was debating this old idea of

reincarnation you know in the Indian religions Hinduism Buddhism Jainism

Sikhism all of them have this common belief in karma and reincarnation many

many births you die and you're born again anytime you're bonding the body dies but these subtle body continues

from life to life to life and in the Abrahamic religions you have the idea of one but you just created and that's the

end when you die this the end and it's not really the end you wait for a mortal life afterwards now this my or monk was

thinking about arguments in favor of the reincarnation and against it and finally

in the hermitage which he was saying in the Himalayas the other monks got tired of this argumentation they stopped

listening to his arguments so he went out of our Hermitage to the next school

new school of parantha and he went to the Vedanta Master there an old Swami and said swami look here are the

arguments against reincarnation let me tell you in Hindi and translate back into English it works nicely in Hindi

send about pull up gentlemen punar janma means reincarnation rebirth and the

Vedanta Master there stopped him right there you said wait job John Medina eat

up with Arjun makuhita when there is no birth at all there is the question of rebirth you has pure existence you will

never burn the body was born it's an appearance within you if in a mirror

many bodies are reflected once at one after another we'll both of them is the mirror really born many times as

different parties no it's just the mirror in which all that these are appearing and they depend on the mirror the mirror doesn't depend on them and

the and the Swami said to our Swami go and read them and ochio phoenician and that Swami our son he told me he was

very irritated you can't have a serious discussion with these non duelists they'll always push you back to Brahman

and then solve the problem forever one more point and I'm done

and really we have coming into this nice segue into the application of all of this he says brahmer no yacht hot Miam

the - - Sheila me ash on data to the Sheena you remember in the original birthday was dis phrase the Caesars of

reality - ah - she the seers of reality he's explaining this those who have made

their second nature to see the pure existence in every experience they are

the seers of reality he says here

further how do you experience the world now from this vantage point because I am

a son neighbor marici jolivet meteor positive all of these are effects they

are all appearances in me the primal cause and as pure existence they all

borrow from me their existence they appear in me as water appears in a

mirage they do not exist even in media to not exist but they appeared because of my existence they means world body

mind thoughts all of that I am the existence in which all of this appears

the Vedanta I'll give you a couple of stories and then end before we go to question answers how he applied this one

bead onto master whom I really liked he passed away few years ago in the Himalayas he was a wandering monk a

traditional wandering monk and people considered him to be enlightened he didn't know much about modern science

and technology so when somebody showed him an x-ray how it works he was so

excited he was telling us Luke Swami's here is this light which penetrates skin

and flesh and blood and go straight and takes a picture of the bones such should

be the vision of a Swami of a monk of a of a sphere of reality

Mahatma Christie I see who new child in Hindi in Hindi your make your vision

like the legs like something like Superman where you do not stop with the

appearance that it's a person with certain qualities good bad know that no you see the person

is focus on the business anything it works pain don't focus on the pain how

awful it is is focus on the being on which the pain depends you can try it

disturbed mind oh it's horrible oops that person said such and such thing to me maybe he's right I'm awful all of

those thoughts don't deny them look at them they are is they all exist one

after another look at the isness of all of them the isness is common to all of them praise and blame success and

failure health and sickness birth and death all come and depend on that one

business which is always available to you in every experience the Swami said make your vision such that in every

experience make it a habit to concentrate on the eath Ness rather on the form of the experience one you know

what will happen if you really try it even for a short while people haven't

this experience it's suddenly for a moment if you as if you are walking with your head down on the ground and seeing

shadows and light and all that suddenly look up straight stare into the sun

blazing forth with an incredible brightness you will come across your own

glory and immortal being consciousness which you are reflected in everything

that you experience everywhere all around you you will sing with the seers of ancient times rarest album from I am

jacket oh the entire world is filled with being Brahman which I am I salute

the glory that I am Villa calendar would

save shocking rhetoric you would say Krishna and Christ's and Buddha's are

waves of the ocean that I am NOT Vivekananda not a person Vivekananda he

meant that pure being that absolute which appears as so many waves in this

ocean keep your vision on that that is

the practice it works it helps you to bear with inevitable ups

and downs in the world of appearances when when you know the story about Hari

Maharaj asking shri ramakrishna now you can also try it how are you today sir

and you suffering from throat cancer and an awful form of cancer he was dying of throat cancer and Sri Ramakrishna said

it hurts I cannot eat and hurry the young man who became Swami torreón and

he says but I see that you're in great bliss what a cruel thing to say to a kid

dying cancer patient you might say and Sweden Krishna burst out laughing and he

said oh the rascal has got me out the rascal has caught me out has found me

out yes what is what's happening there there is something available to him

which he sees which we do not if I am there cancer-ridden body suffering yes

it's suffering but isness behind it no suffering there actually it's possible

that same turian energy in a later life when he is in in Banaras and he was

suffering a lot physically not a physical problems before he died and then somebody asked him are you

suffering a lot Swami and he smiled and said no in Bengali taku patata Borov

corrugation sri ramakrishna has made inside me is a mass of ice isness it's

completely cooling without an air condition also one unchanging mass of business even

there you see the isness you see is immediately you settle into that

calmness another example Swami Sivananda when he was in Banaras show me Swami

Sivananda he was suffering from asthma and could not sleep the whole night the next morning and he was suffering really

suffering you see as my exist in the body the body induce variants exist occur at this level next morning when

the Swap the Swami's came to offer their pronounce they found him sitting with absolutely serene face and a face a

faint smile Swami aren't you suffering and he says look at the dualistic

language he uses he says last night Baba Vishwanath she whines Banaras he came

and he made the two separate I can see

lot of smiles coming up because you can understand now what he means can you understand between these two here is the body of Shivan on the way

with asthma and suffering but in all of that am I not there

do I not exist is that isness not there and does the business have asthma no it

is the isness it's the witness of the asthma it is the very ground which enables the body which is as mine if not asthma to exist

everything that we experience in the universe depends on your experience you

upon you you are their universes reveal to you the presence of all things in the

universe depends on you even in their absence all things have absent the very

experience of the absence of everything depends on you in both cases you are there

he says do to--all are accredited to have been separated we understand what it means he's talking about it in a

dualistic sense that the Lord Shiva came and he separated the pure being from the

body mind now body mind still there still has much still suffering but I also have this within me that lady who

said is there something within me the cancer is not touched there is that

isthmus does that have cancer no it

works I tell you I will not reveal completely but recently somebody got in

touch with me over Skype so many people right so somebody got in touch with me over Skype and said I would like to

speak with you and usually I put them off because it's too much there are too many people coming to trying to speak or

having questions then this person lady she wrote back saying that I don't have

time and dying of cancer can I speak with you I said of course I will speak with you and then we had a series of

conversations I will not reveal details about the person because it's privacy we

had a series of conversations I don't know who was helped more her or me the

dignity the calm is the strength the only thing she never discussed pain or suffering or treatment nothing I could

see that she was disappearing day by day and her caretaker told me that she has only few hours to live maybe a few days

a few hours to live and all she asked was about non-dual Vedanta philosophy

about Buddhist philosophy about how to remain centered as the body I still remember lies she was saying

saying that maybe I think probably I'm going to die she realized that very soon

I said but know that within you the real of you you are immortal

is that not and she burped he's like a cloud you know a Sun coming out from behind the clouds a smile which she gave

and she said that's true Swami I am immortal and she spoke the language of

watching the change change in our life and she said and a few big a few days before I came here

her caregiver she wrote back saying that yesterday she passed up in great

serenity said she when she said I'm glad I was there when she passed away because

there was such calmness and peace and light in that room I held her hand down

to her hand and she calmly went into a kind of deep quietness maybe a

meditation and then she was gone it works actually works in the greatest of blows

death let alone small disappointments suffering it works he says make you make

it a habit to see there is ness that Swami said make it a habit make your vision like that that your vision

penetrates through name-and-form to the easiness like the x-ray penetrates the flesh and blood to the

bones good very bones penetrate through to the very bones of reality which is

pure existence which is what you are then based on that when you look back

upon life you have no problems there are problems there are problems into society

there are problems at the level of the body there problems with level of the mind you can deal with them from a

position of complete security Wittgenstein is to say that religion is a search for perfect security vedanta

says to that it is possible place a perfect security exists that's the real

you I'll take questions

yes base to the microphone there's a

lady there before she asks a question let me as promised quickly run through the seven points of

this commentary don't worry one sentence each I won't take up too much of your

time entire universe is an effect the cause

of which is pure existence which you are effects are false that the pure

existence alone is true brahma satyam jagat mithya brahman is real the world is false and what are you you

are brown man Jeeva Brahm they even offer one to all effects are born and

they die that means they come into existence in the god of existence that means existence comes into them so to

say an existence is lost by them which means none of the effects of intrinsic existence therefore they are false third

every experience of our lives all our experience without exception have two

aspects one aspect is name in fact the other aspect is existence to put it more

simply one aspect is the world the other aspect is God you are never not

experiencing God when we MacArthur says never approach anything except us God is not being rhetorical

he has never been more literal in his life God is available to us in every

experience just need the eyes to see that's the third point in what a point

it is then thought existence is not a part of this world existence is that

which lends reality to the world and all its parts four point fifth point when

all the objects are destroyed suppose no thing is there then existence still continues you cannot perceive it you

cannot experience it that's the fifth point then the sixth

sixth point is how does this world exist in Brahman

he says like water in a mirage really there's no water it appears there really

there is no blue in the sky it appears it looks like that really there is no snake in the rope it appears there there

is no world in you you are unlimited pure existence but it appears in you you

are God playing hide and seek with himself pretending not to be yourself and the last point is remember the x-ray

example how do you live like what do you practice practice dwelling in the isness

x-ray vision Superman's mission see through the names and forms in every experience question

put it next year my mouse right here

right so your question is actually about love and its relationship to its

position in Vedanta love as a feeling in

the mind as an emotion it's an emotion in the mind it's a very positive emotion it's a wonderful thing but it also comes

and goes even to persons who love each other the most imagined the strongest

that love that exists between a mother and her baby there's no greater love than that really

and yet that when that mother goes to sleep she forgets the world she forgets

herself she forgets even the most precious thing in the world her baby and she goes happily into sleep so love just

as a feeling is a feeling it's a wonderful feeling it so may be the best of all feelings and it's the motive of the noblest of aspirations in human life

but it's at the level of this names and forms supported by the isness now is

there no deeper dimension to love when you say love is God is it a meaningless statement is it rhetorical no it is not

in the deepest sense in Vedanta love is God because that's one part we did not

talk about what you call love is this anandam the deepest metaphysically

understood idea of love is bliss that

that thing expressed in human relationships is love so love at its

root is none other than Brahman it's just called Anand at the other place but that love is different from

the certain sense is different from the human experience of love in the sense

our experience of love is limited to persons there are persons we love their parts many many persons we do not love

many persons we dislike many persons who are indifferent to that's human love but

when this one is is realized as your real nature there is nobody and nothing in the world that you will not love

because everything in the universe is an expression of your love everything in

the universe is an expression of the love of God expressed in to elastic language this is metaphysical

non-dualistic language so yes the answer to your question is both at the human

level it's a feeling it's an emotion it can come and go and it can cause immense suffering remember anything that has the

power to make it make you happy is also the power to make you suffer that which

has the power to make you happy in a great extent can make you suffer in a great extent also and human love does

that human love does that hood so Dee what's the solution to it should you

stop loving no no Vedanta does not teach us to become unfeeling bricks and stones

in a wall holy mother said my child

mushara the she said my child love God if you love a human being you it's

guaranteed that you will suffer what does that mean should we not love human beings and then

love some abstraction called card no where do you find this is nice where everywhere in which person in

every person if you're going to love God in every person you will actually end up

loving everybody deep within it'll be a kind of impersonal love not limited to

one being and not exclusive it's it's open to everybody

it's open to everybody you love everybody and I would dare say you love everybody equally because actually

there's no everybody for you it's one one Brahman one card that you're loving the duel in the dualistic religions they

will say I love everybody because I see my krishna and everybody everybody is is an

embodies a manifestation of my krishna krishna i see in the heart of everybody krishna I've seen such pre people I'm

actually seen shows people sub go party when one Mataji told me my email is all

are my baby Krishna and it's not imagination it's become real for her

that which is input in dualistic language this one puts in very precise

metaphysical language and also the advantage of that is if you say everybody's my Krishna you can easily

dismiss it by saying oh she's imagining it she's brainwashed herself into it but

this is not real machine it's just inviting you to have more clarity this is a you're confused now

that come out of confusion look at your experience can you deny that you experienced isness all the time

you cannot I remember speaking with this neuroscientist once she was sitting

under on a plane next to me we had a two hour long conversation and a flight in Europe and I thought she was so

interested in Veda and later on of course it transpired that she was scared of flying so she was talking to industry

but it was an interesting conversation she said I am only nominally nominally

Anglican she's from England but I don't believe in God but tell me about your philosophy so I told her what we learned

about this and you know what she said very sharp she said Swami you have not

convinced me but I cannot find any flaw in the argument it is so elegant and

precise you cannot me there are new me out of this that's the advantage of the

non-dualistic approach right all three

are one in the same thing you see consciousness why do we need sucked if you remove existence from consciousness

it will become a non existent consciousness how's that one is logically impossible look at it this way

I'll put it in another way look at it as an individual being all of us want to

live right existence but if I say okay you can live but you will be in a coal

mine in Mount Sinai or somewhere no no no I don't want to be in the coma I want to be Lily I want to live and I want to

be aware I want to be conscious all the time I'm here okay I see fine you can

live and you can be aware but you'll always be miserable you aware of misery no no no I don't want the head I want to

live I want to be area and you want to be happy without limit everywhere at all times in all

circumstances if it is possible at all well Arthur says yes it is possible in

fact another thing you will see the very concept of consciousness includes the

concept of existence but it's meaningless to talk about non-existence consciousness and the very concept of

bliss includes both consciousness and existence you can't be in bliss without

being conscious of it and very happy but I don't know it I am tremendously happy but I just don't

know it meaningless so happiness depends

upon X is a consciousness and consciousness also depends upon existence existence is fundamental look

at it another way in all things of the world we definitely perceive existence

experience existence right now isn't it true the advantage of approaching the

whole problem of brown hands as existence is because existence is perceived in everything you may try to

argue that everything is conscious but you don't know that look at the

experience of your life where is the only place that you find consciousness tell me tell me no just look at all

don't don't try to look for a correct answer just look report what you're finding right now where do you find

existence first question where everywhere you're sitting in the middle of an ocean of existence everything

exists second question where do you find consciousness right now awareness in you

in you sir Swami isn't the next person person sitting next to be not conscious

are they zombies they could very well be conscious but you are not experiencing

their consciousness the way you feel awareness first person within you right now this is in fact called the hard

problem of consciousness in consciousness studies few decades ago a

philosopher in Australia David Chalmers he said the real problem of consciousness is how do we have this

inner experience of awareness how do we see how to be here not the biological

question just the feeling the experience how does this come about no machine can

duplicate this so he says this is called the hard problem of consciousness and from then on this has become the central

focus of consciousness studies for the last 25 years and I went to this

conference in NYU and who do I meet David Chavez himself

the head of the mind brain and consciousness unit in New York University and I remember asking a

question and David Chalmers pointed out the guy in orange let him ask a question

so consciousness you find only in yourself nowhere else directly right now

you can infer it this person talks like me what's like me so must be conscious

like me but you don't experience it it's called the problem of other minds in philosophy and where do you experience

bliss happiness you'll say in me all the

time in only certain aspects of conscious thinking when the mind is in a

particularly nice state you feel happiness bliss vedanta says all things

in the universe borrow existence from you Brahman the mind itself within you

borrows both existence and consciousness from you Brahman and the mind in a

particularly sattvic state borrows existence consciousness and bliss from you Brahman you yourself in yourself you

are limitless existence consciousness and bliss these are these are not

effects of each other they are not even properties of Brahman they are random they kind of said it's not that the

absolute exists it is existence itself it's not that it has consciousness it is

consciousness it used the word knowledge it is knowledge itself it's not that it is happy it is bliss itself now we begin

to understand what is meant by brahman is not a thing which is you cannot write brahman is it's a wrong statement

philosophically speaking you cannot because what is Brahman is this is Ness Brahma is not a thing which exists all

things exist boring existence and run this is the way we to talk about such

hidden under there was this book a frog

by David Bentley heart he is a eastern orthodox theologian in the eastern US

Christian Church this book is a polemic against the New Atheists Richard Dawkins

and Christopher Hitchens and Daniel Dennett Sam Harris and so on

he says when they they are all against the existence of God and they make fun of religion and all of that and this

David Bentley heart says this is not fair because you're you are criticizing

a straw man the most crude theory in religion that there is a separate God

wakes it's like a super person existing it's easy to knock out that theory but

this is not what the religions of the world at code they are saying you should

go to the core of the religious traditions of the world and his claim is in all of them you will find at the core

that they are making this extraordinary claim that there is an infinite existence consciousness bliss and the

names of the chapters in this book written by Christian theologian are sucked chit Ananda yes he says it's most

clearly expressed in the Indian in the Hindu Vedanta philosophy but he said it is found in Islam and Judaism in

Christianity in Buddhism also in very different language a very different

mythology but the philosophy is most clear in Vedanta which brings us back to Alan Watts the Hindus have the inside

dope tell us when we run out of time yes

yes yes you are

now please repeat the question no you're

looking at an object borrowing the isness from yourself this is a good

question this is miss is not an object remember man woman fan house city ocean atoms

mountains all of them are objects of experience and in all of them you find business

they all exist but it will remove the objective component what will happen to the business still there but is it there

or here is the isness out here in the

world or is it in there if you concentrate you will begin to feel the business is me it's not there I

remember this intense experience I had in the monastery and bellowed when I was teaching this and a young novice he

excitedly it stood up because you see in this verse nowhere it is directly said you are that isness from the context you

have to get it because the whole context is how do we endure pain and suffering what am i which end you makes me end

your pain and suffering so you are the pure is Ness when we are talking about this this young novice a brahmacari he

got up excitedly and he said but Maharaja then that is this I am that

isness I said yes you are that isness this face was so bright and excited and

it it's quite amazing I mean I don't know what to make of it 48 hours later he was dead

yes they thought he drowned in the Ganges but I have a different theory

don't worry it's not fatal enlightening [Music]

two more questions I come okay then come to you yes that's from the point of view

of consciousness that's from Rabindranath Tagore's poem so the Ruby is red cult my my consciousness colors

the ruby red and the emerald green what it basically means is it's in my

consciousness that everything gets its existence we'll see in the meditation

today how we are oceans of existence and consciousness in which the entire

universe all of this there waves in the ocean that you are you are not a body

you're not even just a mind all bodies and minds and things of the universe are

but waves arising and floating and playing around my ear unto Muhammad Oh

in me the infinite ocean of existence now you can all understand just like that this is the highest adwaita from

ashtavakra gita my anta muhammad Oh in me the infinite ocean of existence

asharamji Bobby Jo how wonderful are these individual the waves which are

these individual beings with the indignant aquiline T provision T's or

Hobbiton they are born in me as babies they come up and they play

kill until they play with each other once WOM in the Himalayas quoting this verse and he said they play with each

other 90 the clash with each other they fight with each other and this one he was saying

they play with each other I love you I love you and then them getting married and then grunty I'm going to divorce you

I'm going to divorce if they're all me they are all me provision to swap harlot

and the William subside back in death they all subside back into the ocean I am assumptions based on anecdotes yes

now when the pessimist steps forward he would say no life is fundamentally sad

and pessimistic and then my question is how do you respond to that all right

the Vedantic approach the ultimate reality is always defined as bliss

existence consciousness without inner nature is bliss I remember Viktor Frankl I saw this

documentary so that's my preferred referring to it I was so thrilled when he used that language being bliss is

meaning his ultimate meaning the way your very existence which is also the the very existence is bliss and this

being bliss hyphenated is meaning in life it's very profound statement

account translate it into valent it becomes soft and Ananda is ultimate meaning in life Swami Vivekananda says

truth knowledge and the Bliss that follows both it is the very experience

of your infinite existence and consciousness which is which is bliss but Brahman itself is defined as bliss

in the eye teary opposition on and Umbra multiple jhana no Brahman to be bliss

now coming to your question it's interesting when you come to the post upanishadic philosophies without a fail

they seem to be dark and gloomy pessimistic Buddhism Buddhism starts

with the fundamental assertion sarvam to come everything is suffering everything is

suffering you see no that's too much there's some jolyon's are not suffering well then Buddhism has not begun for you

so I mean the physiology it seems used to say the Buddhism is a serious religion you first read even a very

beginning you have to be convinced everything without exception is suffering suffering is suffering

enjoyment is suffering all of it is suffering to begin with but not just

Buddhism Jainism if you look at the classical Hindu philosophies the ayah

what is the goal of spiritual life it is to be delivered from suffering why sheikha what is the goal of spiritual

life it's to bring an end to suffering Sankhya what is the goal of spiritual life pestered afflicted by the three

kinds of suffering the suffering inflicted by nature suffering inflicted by other beings and internal suffering

from our own minds and bodies afflicted by three kinds of sufferings people all

human beings are seeking for a see cessation of suffering it does not even

say they're seeking joy they're just seeking relief from suffering and ultimately they find only in spiritual

life can a final end to suffering be found Sankhya yoga what happens in enlightenment you are separated from the

universe from prakruti from nature you remain as pure consciousness no mention of Ananda you remain as pure awareness

in serenity no positive bliss there so all these

post to Panasonic philosophies they concentrated on suffering and an end to suffering that was what spirituality was

about but Vedanta is constantly without

fail asserts that positive bliss is to be found and your real nature is bliss in fact the entire universe misperceived

suffering truly understood this entire universe there are waves and waves of

please you said I don't see that this way I see it as crime and terrible suffering and most horrible

things in the world you are on this side of the ignorance once we cross over and see the reality

as it is and see yourself as it is you see the underlying bliss whose

expressions are pleasure and pain whose expressions are pleasure anything

right I'll come to you one more point you go further down into the Bugbee

philosophies which come about a thousand years back 1500 years back the

philosophies of love dualistic philosophies and they are all without exception philosophies of are in the

bliss the presence of Krishna of the

Divine Mother Collyer or Durga or Rob or whatever the guard oriented religions

especially in Hinduism they are all religions of love and then they love their place so this is the answer which

I'm giving you the question of bliss versus suffering last question yes can i

I'm sorry to interrupt I'll say let me stick to the vedantic party line you say our natural expression is there is

easiness in everything there aren't they will say no there is everything in isness

yes I did myself yes yes no to

experience myself I do not need myself an easiness according to Vedanta my self

is the vessel and to experience this is Ness I need body mind world universe if you

want to experience it if God again back to that profound little story if God

wants to play hide and seek then God needs somebody to play hide and seek with but there's nobody else

there's only isness how is it isn't it see itself so it needs a mirror it needs

something which will reflect itself back to it they need things in the existence

of things pure existence experiences itself let me put it that way God disguises himself as not God as you

and me and all and hence God experiences himself only problem is God was so good at it God forgot that God is God and God

began to think that God is Swami serve Opryland that our God is dr. Mike and God and then some Sahara starts whereas

what isn't immediately in reintroduces God to God in fact the Kashmiri Shia

philosophy is called enlightenment recognition frontier he beyond recognition

you suddenly recognize yourself and everybody else and his entire universe as that limitless existence

consciousness bliss which you are so

thank you very much are there some announcements yes please thank you I

think we've got enough to chew up on now some physical food is necessary

like a thing Swamy sovereignty Anandi as you can see there's a great clarity

in the way he explains things and we get insight and for those who have questions

is gonna be an hour of QA that will be from 6:30 to 7:30 so right now just

before you leave your seat some we have lunch for everybody stop the could very subtly from ISKCON me or having catered

and so after it's over you please leave from this door and go to the to the

backyard at five o'clock we will be having art they will open the doors

around 4:30 swami needs to rest we need to get everything to be stored in order so by 4:30 you can come back again if

you have seats that are reserved you can leave your signs there at the end of day we will take them off you'll have to

come back again tomorrow but for those that have there if you have a yellow sign leave it in your seat we have

different people coming in the evening also so if you want to reserve a seat keep it there and finally then five

o'clock not like I said not everybody will fit so whoever can sit down the floor and feel fine

it'll be about 20 minutes for our tea then Swami I'll come over here and approximately about about 5:30 we'll

start a guided meditation which he's going to say the practical stuff the

practical techniques of what he's been talking about and then again six o'clock supper I need to do a supper count meaning

those that are not attending for supper because there's some that are not going to be able to come please can you raise

your hand


please don't bring food or drinks to lecture hall waters okay so with this we

conclude and we thank everybody for coming and please leave with the double doors here and we'll see you back at

five o'clock