Envisaging Our Spiritual Existence – Part 2

This is in continuation of the last posting on the wonderful lecture given by our beloved Guru Maharaj in Abudhabi, on the verse from Srimad Bhagavad Gita 2.55:

Envisaging Our Spiritual Existence – Part 1

sri -bhagavan uvaca
prajahaati yadaa kaamaan / sarvaan paartha mano-gataan
aatmany evaatmanaa tushtah / sthita-prajnas tadochyate

The Supreme Personality of Godhead said: "O Paartha, when a man gives up all varieties of desire for sense gratification, which arise from mental concoction, and when his mind, thus purified, finds satisfaction in the self alone, then he is said to be in pure transcendental consciousness."

4. Be satisfied in your own spiritual existence:

The way to leave the mental platform is to be satisfied in your own spiritual existence with the help of the purified mind. Krishna says ‘aatmany eva aatmanaa tushtah’. ’Tushtah’ is very important. You have to be satisfied. We are alive today means we have to thank Krishna. It is His mercy. He again and again gives us the days but it is all bound to end. Krishna uses the word ‘eva’ which means this satisfaction in our spiritual existence has to be certainly done. If we do this, then we have left manogataan – mental concoction and also kaamaan – sense gratification. And we come to the spiritual existence. Body is coming and going. Krishna says in Srimad Bhagavad Gita 2.13:

dehino ’smin yathaa dehe / kaumaaram yauvanam jaraa
tathaa dehaantara-praaptir / dhiras tatra na muhyati

"As the embodied soul continuously passes, in this body, from boyhood to youth to old age, the soul similarly passes into another body at death. A sober person is not bewildered by such a change."

This is not just the exercise of the mind. It is a fact. There is an ocean of difference between mere exercise and fact. Facts never change whether we know it or not, whether we believe it or not. If the facts do not change, then the instructions of Bhagavad Gita are a must. So how can we leave Bhagavad Gita? Somehow or the other, the obnoxious mind must be forced to be attracted to the instructions of Bhagavad gita and Srimad Bhagavatam. Manogataan (mental concoctions) always leads to hellish life. Money is never enough. We are never satisfied with the money we have got. We have to draw a line somewhere. Being satisfied with whatever we have is one of the important conditions to make Krishna happy.

Srimad Bhagavatam 4.31.19:

dayayaa sarva-bhuteshu / santushtyaa yena kena vaa
sarvendriyopashaantyaa ca / tushyaty aashu janaardanah

"By showing mercy to all living entities, being satisfied somehow or other and controlling the senses from sense enjoyment, one can very quickly satisfy the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Janaardana."

We are always running after the bodily needs and this is not our way. To the minimum extent we should be there. Our goal of existence is ‘aatmany eva aatmana tushtah’ Purified mind will definitely help us to go to the spiritual existence. ‘sa vai manah krishnapadaaravindayoh’ As soon as Krishna is there, purification is there. We are all Krishna drunkards in the PUB (Prabhupada Unlimited Bhagavatam). As soon as Krishna, Srimad Bhagavatam and Srila Prabhupada’s name is there, there are no inebrities. No place is bad. Only our objectives are bad.

The pure state of the soul is described as ‘sattvam vishuddham vasudeva-shabditam‘ – “When a man is situated in pure goodness, he worships Vaasudeva.” Krishna appears in the vishuddha sattva state. That is why He is called vaasudeva. This is extra purified auspiciousness (atimangala). It is this state which helps us to be at ease. ‘At ease’ means, everything goes on and we pay more attention to the pure existence of the soul. This process is not sectarian. It is eternal and applies to everyone. Just the four words ‘aatmany eva aatmanaa tushtah’ takes us out of the manogataan. If the soul is very pure, how much purer the Supersoul must be? Purified mind will never be satisfied unless you come to the extremely purified mind Krishna. Eventually every verse draws us to the Supreme Absolute Truth – satyam param dhimahi. It is our experience that in the material world also, if a person is honest and true, we like him. Why is it that we like a man of good character? These things prove that Bhagavad gita is beyond any doubt and that is why it is supreme.

We all want to be situated in the pure state and for that how much our life must be pure? Leave all the scratch. Anything you do apart from this is hellish. The whole life program to take us to the spiritual existence is chalked out here and spiritual existence is our monopoly. We can never be material. Manogataan life is hellish. The hellish life is in front of us and there are different paths also. But everything falls short in front of bhakti. In bhakti only, there is experience of the pure existence of the soul. There is no ‘purified mind’ injection to achieve this. You have to try and experience yourself. Every soul has a pure existence. Every soul has a dirty mind. The mind has to be purified and the way of purification is the chanting of the Hare Krishna maha mantra. Chaitanya Mahaprabhu instructs this in Shiksaashtakam and see how it cooperates with the Bhagavad gita principle! Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is non-different from Bhagavad Gita principle. Those who stick to Bhagavad Gita are like Krishna.

A grain of putting Bhagavad Gita into practice is more important than tons of knowledge of Bhagavad Gita. Be steady with the last 18 verses of the second chapter of Bhagavad Gita.

Thank you very much.
Yours in the service of Srila Prabhupada and Gurudev,
Vaijayanthimala devi dasi
Abudhabi.

Disclaimer: This article was originally published in the Yahoo Groups run by the disciples of H H Mahavishnu Goswami Maharaj – http://groups.yahoo.com/group/granthraj/ by the devotee name mentioned above. The posting in this article, is original realizations of our Guru Maharaj and the devotee who wrote this. Any comments regarding this article would be passed on directly to the devotee. In this article, ‘Maharaj’ and ‘Gurudev’ implicitly refer to our spiritual master H H Mahavishnu Goswami Maharaj.