Verses 13.28–13.31🔗

Kṛṣṇa says, ‘Anyone who has reached Self-realization or the ultimate consciousness sees that the Supreme Self is present in all living and non-living entities. He perceives the Supreme Self as the indestructible, beginning-less witnessing consciousness.’ The Existence that we see is not comprised of individual entities. We think that we are separate from others around us. In reality, we are all one. The same Supreme Self, Parameśvara that Kṛṣṇa speaks about is present in all of us and in everything we see around us. As I tell everyone, ‘I am not here to prove that I am God, I am here to prove that you are God.’ This is the truth.

When I say this, people say, ‘No, no, Swamiji. How can we be God? We have done many sins. We agree that you are God because you have healing powers. But how can we be God?’ Please understand one thing. It is not that you are not God because you have committed sins. Understand that you do not become a devil if you commit a sin. You are still God. Sins do not qualify or disqualify you from being a God. Your nature is Godliness. Sin is a concept developed by society to control people. The soul of a robber has the same qualification to reach the truth as that of a priest in a temple.

We create a barrier between God and us. We are not ready to believe that what we call God is inside us also. We happily accept someone else standing in front of us as God; however, we cannot accept that the same God is inside us. Society would find it difficult to keep us under control if we were to call ourselves Gods! Let me tell you an incident from my own life: I left home at seventeen with nothing, nothing at all, and traveled northwards in India. As I had vowed to carry no money, I traveled without a ticket on train. In the northern part of India, my saffron robe was a passport to free travel.

No one bothered me. However, once when I was traveling towards Kolkata, a ticket examiner asked for my ticket. In my broken Hindi mixed with the local language of Bengali, I asked him, ‘What ticket? I am Brahman (universal energy). This train is Brahman. You are Brahman. Why ticket?’ He was a good man. Not only did he let me travel without a ticket, he also bought food for me! Yes, we are all Brahman. God is everywhere. Divine energy fills and overflows in all places. The only problem is we do not see this. We only see one thing at a time. We see God as someone different and powerful.

We create a big gap between God and us. People in the West call Hindus ‘idol worshippers’. They make fun KṣetraKṣetrajñaVibhāgaYogaḥ TheFieldAndTheKnowerOftheField 987 of them. Actually there are people in India too who make fun of idol worship. All the so-called intellectuals and scientific people look down upon people who worship idols. Some so-called neo-vedantis preach Vedānta but consider idol worship unscientific. The same is true about performing rituals like homa (fire rituals) or abhiṣekha (water rituals). We should understand there is more than an idol in front of us when we worship. When we worship, we worship through the idol. We do not worship the idol itself. When we see the energy behind the idol and worship that energy, that worship has value.

That is the science also. Let me ask you, why do we feel a great sense of relief after we pray to God sincerely? Why do we feel a sense of satisfaction when we come out of the temple after prayers? Why do we feel light? When we see the energy behind the idol and worship that energy, we connect to that energy. When I say we connect to that energy, we create a channel for the soul that is inside us to connect to the supreme Self. This brief time of connection relieves us from our burdens of duties. We see the Supreme Spirit in the idol and pour out our problems in the form of prayers.

We feel relieved because we have full faith in the Supreme Spirit, Param Īśvara. We have full confidence that the Supreme Spirit will take care of us. We believe in the supreme spirit but we do not believe that the soul that we see in us is also the supreme spirit! We are not able to internalize this truth. Everything Is The Supreme Spirit, Parameśvara Kṛṣṇa says the soul, ātma that is in us and the soul, ātma that is in others is the Supreme Spirit and the Supreme Soul. But what do we do? We isolate our soul. We define a boundary for our soul and separate it from the Supreme Spirit, Parameśvara.

It is like this. There are ten pots of water and there is the reflection of the sun in all the ten pots. Each pot thinks that it holds the sun. All ten pots think that each one is holding a different sun. In the same way, we think the soul inside us is different from the soul outside us. When we see the same soul everywhere in everything, when we break the pots, we see what the supreme Self is. Kṛṣṇa says, ‘When we see that the Supreme Soul that resides in us and in everything around us—samaṁ sarveśu bhūteṣu tiṣṭhaṁ parameśvara, is indestructible—avinaśyantam, we see the truth.’ The only thing that lives forever is the soul.

We should understand that. Everything else must die one day. When we realize this truth, when we understand that only the soul can remain forever, our whole race to get more and more becomes worthless. We realize, ‘What is the use of running after things that we know are not going to be with us forever?’ When this is realized, we see the truth­ . The mind is the only obstacle on the path to reach the ultimate goal. In the previous verse, Kṛṣṇa tells us how we can see the truth. Here Kṛṣṇa talks about the hurdle that we must cross. He says that when we are not degraded or influenced by the mind, we can see the supreme spirit in everything.

Only when we can do that, can we reach the final destination. We talk about the mind as separate from ourselves. We say, ‘It is thinking a lot.’ We do not understand what the mind is and we start talking about it. What is the mind actually? It is only an organized structure gifted by God as a tool. The mind is man’s servant that helps satisfy his needs and necessities in order to lead a happy life. The reason for the incompletions is that the mind, which should be under the control of man, has become a structure that controls man. If a servant behaves like a master, what will happen?

An immature servant becoming a master is like catching a monkey and putting it on the throne. If we can keep the mind aside for a while, we see the truth as it is. Our mind cannot accept that the Supreme Soul is in everything around us. Our soul inside us knows that the Supreme Soul is everywhere. But our mind creates a strong sheath around it. Our mind takes control over us. It harbors past memories (saṁskāras) and creates an illusion that leads to wrong cognition. When we were children, the mind did not have much power. When we were children, we did not build new root thought patterns, saṁskāras.

KṣetraKṣetrajñaVibhāgaYogaḥ TheFieldAndTheKnowerOftheField 989 The conditioning by society builds layers and layers of these saṁskāras that give power to the mind. Actually when people say that a child is growing up, it only implies that the child is growing smaller and smaller, only the mind is growing up. The soul is being pushed into a corner and the mind, with its root thought patterns, is given more and more power. This mind prevents us from seeing the Supreme Soul in everything around us. Be very clear, if we are out of the clutches of the mind, we see reality. We are safe as long as we can separate the Self from the body and watch as the body reacts to materialistic things.

As long as we know that the soul is supreme and the body is a means to fulfill our worldly desires, we are safe. We are on the right path of completion. However, when we place the body over the soul, the incompletion starts. We give so much importance to this body, but we don’t really respect it. Instead we make use of it. We abuse our body. We consider our body to be a tool to experience the sense pleasures from the outside world. That is why we take care of our body. We want our body to be safe so that we can enjoy. We want our body to look good all the time.

We must understand why we assume this human body form and come to planet Earth. This birth that we have taken is to fulfill the carried-over desires of our previous births. These desires are called prārabdha karma. Our soul has taken this body to fulfill our prārabdha karma. When we die, our last thought decides our next birth. Our soul chooses the body that can fulfill the desires of our last birth. This is the truth. Understand that we assume a body to fulfill the desires carried over from our previous life. However, what happens is that we create new desires in this life as well. We use our body to experience the sense pleasures and we create more and more desires.

Because of this, we fall into the cycle of birth and death. Once we realize that our soul takes this body to complete a mission that it left unfinished in our previous birth, our attitude towards our whole body will change. People ask me, ‘Swamiji, why do Enlightened Masters take human birth? Why do they need a body if they are already enlightened, if they have fulfilled all their desires?’ There is a beautiful incident from Rāmakṛṣṇa Paramahamsa’s life, the Enlightened Master, Incarnation. He told his disciples, ‘Once when I was returning from my village in an ox cart, some robbers stopped us. I started repeating all the names of Gods so that at least one would work.’

He then explains why even Enlightened Masters hold onto their body. He says beautifully, ‘A little of my mind is attached to the body so that it can enjoy the love of God and the company of the devotees.’ See how beautifully he says it. Please listen. An Enlightened Master holds onto his body out of pure compassion for others. An Enlightened Master wants to see transformation in others and he can do it more effectively when he is in the body. He does not have any other desire. He can leave his body any time. He holds his body through a thin thread of ego for enriching others. We always want to get more and more out of our body.

We want our eyes to see more television; we want our stomach to hold more food; we want our ears to hear louder music. We do all this out of greed. We want to experience more and more sense pleasures. Instead, if we look at our body with gratitude, when we thank our body every moment for the support it has given us, we connect with our body at a deeper level. The Self Does Nothing Our body is the temple of our soul. We should respect our body. We should look at our body with gratitude, not greed. We should thank our body, prakṛti for holding our spirit, our soul, ātma.

Then, we will see a different dimension of our body. Here Kṛṣṇa says, whatever we think we are enjoying, actually it is the body that is enjoying—prakṛtaiva ca karmāṇi kriyamāṇāni sarvaśaḥ KṣetraKṣetrajñaVibhāgaYogaḥ TheFieldAndTheKnowerOftheField 991 (13.30). Our body enjoys all the material comforts. Our soul can live without them. Our soul is pure consciousness. It does not need anything external to keep it happy. Actually our soul is always in a state of bliss. It is always ecstatic. Our body is an embodiment of bliss. Whatever material things we think we need, whatever material comforts we think we enjoy, they are needed and enjoyed only by our body. Our soul does not need any of them.

The problem starts when we think that our soul needs these material things. We associate the happiness from the external materials with our soul. This is where the problem begins. We think the happiness that we gain from material comforts is because our soul feels happy to have them. That is when we accumulate more and more of these material comforts. We run after them. Kṛṣṇa gives us a technique here. He says, when we watch our body enjoying the sense pleasures, when we watch only our body being associated with the external material comforts and not our soul, we see the truth. Just witness the body. Be aware of your body.

Observe the body when it reacts to external things. You will notice a sense of separation from the body. You will see what your body is. You will see that your soul has nothing to do with the pleasures you are enjoying. When you do this, you witness your body and mind as if you are an outsider. It is like watching a movie. When you watch a movie, you watch what happens on the screen. In the same way, when you watch your body and mind, you understand what Kṛṣṇa says. Only when you witness that the body experiences material pleasures and it is the body that does everything and the soul does not need anything, you see the truth.

Kṛṣṇa gives the great truth of advaita in this verse. He talks about collective consciousness. He says when we see the Supreme Soul in all living beings, we no longer see the separateness. We see everything as one single entity. We see the whole Universe as one single body, as one entity expressing the same truth of oneness. Please be very clear, we are all connected. Each and every living entity is connected to the other. Your thoughts affect the thoughts of the person sitting beside you. Whether or not you believe it, this is the truth. We think we are individual consciousness. We think we are separate islands. We think our thoughts are limited to us.

We think nobody watches our thoughts. Please listen. The whole Universe constantly responds to your thoughts. The whole Universe is made up of the same Universal consciousness. Actually there is nothing but Universal consciousness. Individual consciousness is a piece of the hologram of the universal collective consciousness. What happens when you break a hologram into five pieces? Each piece becomes a hologram again. Each piece shows the same thing as the whole piece showed you before. Our individual consciousness is like that hologram. The Universal consciousness hologram is broken into many small holograms or individual living things. But each one of us has the same consciousness as the universal consciousness.

You see, your individual consciousness is like an onion. What do you see in an onion? There are layers over layers of skin. When you peel the onion layer by layer, what is there inside? Nothing! You are just like that onion. You think the onion is solid. Only when you peel, you see that there is nothing inside it. In the same manner, if you peel all the individual body-mind layers, you experience that you are the collective consciousness. Once you remove all the layers, you see that every entity around you has the same consciousness. Everything is the same. From the beginning, from your birth, society starts creating new layers on you.

In the process, the innocent, childlike nature that sees the Self in everything is slowly lost in us. As a child you do lots of things through which you connect to the Self. You do not know you are different from soil or earth. That is why you play with mud. But what do parents do? They scold you. ‘Don’t do this. Don’t do that.’ They say, ‘You will get dirty. Your clothes will become dirty.’ We continuously impose societal conditions on the child. The child KṣetraKṣetrajñaVibhāgaYogaḥ TheFieldAndTheKnowerOftheField 993 does not know what is dirty or what is clean. The child sees the soil just the same as the floor.

He does not see any difference. He connects to the same energy when he plays on the dusty road or inside a clean house. Adults condition children to see the difference, the duality. When we remove these conditionings caused by our body-mind association, we see that everything is pure consciousness. Only then we see that we are all the same. Only then we experience the space of non-duality, Advaita. That is what Kṛṣṇa says here. When we see that the Supreme Soul resides in each of us, we see that all of us are connected to each other. When we see this, we see the truth of living Advaita. We see that the whole Universe is the expansion of the same consciousness­—tata eva ca vistāraṁ brahma sampadyate tadā (13.31). The whole Universe is the expression of the same truth. Soul Situated in Body Does Nothing