Bhagya:
Swami! What is the reason for all this misery, depression and tensions?
How to remove them? None can explain clearly except Yourself.
The devotees who are very close to you are really blessed since
They are serving you closely, we are far from you and so unfortunate.
I feel that I am not doing your service properly and so slipping from you.
Swami:
Oh! Wife of Surya! And mother of Datta! How you are also attacked by
Darkness and ignorance? You are staying with both these two in your home
Surya means Sun and darkness should not enter and Datta is the Divine preacher
Therefore ignorance should not enter your brain, it is surprising!
Perhaps, the close association develops the opposite nature intensively.
Just below the lamp-stand darkness exists though the light spreads everywhere.
Devotees who are far from the human form of Lord are very fortunate
Since they concentrate intensively on the Lord as the form of knowledge.
Devotees who are very close to the Lord are constantly observing His Body
His human body follows all the rules of nature and therefore constantly
Gives the impression that the Lord is a human being only and not divine.
The human body takes food, drinks and gives the impression of human being
Thus, the close devotees are constantly attacked by illusion or Maya.
They have to put up a continuous effort to throw out this Maya.
The devotees who are far are not affected, as they need not have this strain.
The close devotees are polluted by this continuous attack of illusion
They start neglecting the Lord and sometimes-even insult the Lord.
This is said in the Gita “Avajananti Maam” and thus they loose the Lord.
Once, Radha came to Dwaraka from all along the Brindavanam
Rukmini gave a cup of hot milk to Radha and she also took the same
Then, both went to see the Lord who was sleeping in His bedroom
They found the Lord red in colour by the attack of some hot thing
Both were shocked and asked the Lord for the reason of that
The Lord told that since He was in the heart of Radha and since
Radha took the hot milk; He was heated and became red in colour
Then Rukmini asked that she was also drinking the same hot milk everyday
But she never found the Lord effected like that on any day
She asked the Lord whether it meant that He was not in her heart
She also added that she was always closely associated with the Lord
The Lord replied that He was not in the heart of Rukmini and the reason was
That close association itself, the Lord further said that the close association
Will decrease the attention and thus the concentration gets slowly diluted
Hearing this, Radha immediately left Dwaraka and went to Brindavanam
Because she feared that the Lord may quit her heart if she was in Dwaraka
Of course! What I told is a general rule and one or two exceptions exist
Adisesha was closely associated with the Lord as His constant bed
Yet, when he was born as Lakshmana He attended the Lord always
And he did not eat or sleep and stood continuously for fourteen years
I shall clear your doubt since you both belong to My inner circle
Let Me answer your question straight with a simple example
You have caught a hot iron rod with your hand and you are weeping
You are asking Me to remove the heat from the rod and give you happiness
For this you are constantly praying the Lord to use His special power.
I have to laugh at this situation because the easiest solution is to remove
Your hand from the rod to be happy, which you are not doing at all
You cannot get rid of your attachment to the rod, but you pray the Lord
To cool the rod using His Maya, is this prayer justified in any way?
Why don’t you get detached from your family bonds and be happy?
The hand with which you have caught your family members is your mind
You detach your mind from the bonds of your family members
And be peaceful always and there is no need of praying the Lord for this
When the solution is in your hand why do you ask the Lord for it?
When the solution is out of your hands there may be justice in asking the Lord
In the first stage you detach your mind from them and be worry less
In course of time when your detachment by mind becomes complete
You will spontaneously leave your duties also and attain bliss
The detachment from the family comes by your attachment with the Lord
As the bond with the Lord becomes more and more strong, your family bonds
Become weaker and weaker and finally all the bonds disappear
In this state you are left over only with the bond with the Lord
This state is called “Eka Bhakthih” in the Gita or the single pointed devotion
Devotion means love and this is related to the plane of mind
As the faculty of intelligence becomes more and more sharp
By the knowledge preached by the Lord, the devotion to Lord
Becomes more and more strong, thus knowledge is acting as
Both fertilizer as well as pesticide on both the sides simultaneously
It acts as a fertilizer for the bond with the Lord, which is like a plant
The plant grows slowly and becomes a huge tree by this fertilizer
The family bonds are like the insects that attack this devotion plant
For those insects this divine knowledge acts as a pesticide also
The knowledge is also the generating factor like the water for the seed
Only by the knowledge of the Lord, the devotion is generated
Devotion is the love or attraction towards the Lord to attain Him
It ends in agony or Vedana as told by Ramanuja, thus knowledge is
The generating factor, the fertilizer and the pesticide simultaneously.
When Rukmini heard all the details of Lord Krishna from sage Narada
She developed intensive attraction for the Lord and that is devotion
Shankara emphasized on the knowledge and Ramanuja on devotion
Knowledge is the generator of devotion and devotion is the cause
For the achievement of the Lord, by the devotion of Rukmini only
The Lord came and married her, thus devotion ends in the achievement of the Lord
The Gita says the same “Bhaktya tvananyaya”, now when the devotion is full
The family bonds are completely broken; Rukmini did not care for her
Brother and parents and even the tradition, therefore, as the devotion grows
The family bonds are cut simultaneously, without the attachment to Lord
The detachment from family is impossible because only after tasting
The divine nectar, one can leave all the worldly drinks spontaneously
Attachment of one thing should lead to the detachment of other thing
Simple detachment from the family without the attachment to the Lord
Becomes impossible, even if achieved does not stand permanently
Without tasting the divine nectar, if you leave the worldly drinks
It is meaningless and one day or other you will run to the worldly drinks
Finally, the real devotion is proved only by the selfless service
Rukmini served the Lord after attaining Him, she constantly pressed
His divine feet and her aim was not to become the queen of Dwaraka
Madhva shows this service as the real proof of the true love
In the beginning you should try for the detachment from the family
By withdrawing your attraction or mind slowly from these worldly bonds
This can be achieved once you start binding yourself with the Lord
The attachment to the Lord is directly proportional to the detachment
From the worldly bonds, but don’t think that you have been detached fully
The full detachment by mind from the worldly bonds can be tested by you
As the mind gets detached, the concentration in the duties is diluted
Don’t fear that this may spoil your duties. No! Never! Be sure!
Because your detachment from the duty is due to your attachment to the Lord
The Lord will take care of your duties, in fact that is far below to His level
His servants like Hanuman will take care of the success in your duties
If your duty is diluted due to your laziness or diversion to some other
Worldly affair, then your duty will be definitely spoiled, but if you become
His devotee, will the Lord keep silent if your duties are failing?
This is the real point of the faith on the Lord, practical field is real
Devotees say that they have full faith in the Lord, but they fail in practice
Their faith is only theoretical, when practical comes they slip tremendously
Some people say that their mind is fully dedicated to the Lord and
Just they are doing the duties externally, this is a complete hypocrisy
Because the duty is always proportional to the attachment of the mind
By the will of the mind only you can do anything, if the mind is not willing
You can do nothing. Therefore, your action is a mirror of your mind
When you are doing the worldly actions or duties, your mind is certainly
Absorbed and concentrated on the worldly affairs only, don’t fool the Lord
Can the omniscient Lord be fooled by your hypocrisy? Then whom you are fooling?
Are you fooling the public? What is the use of it? Finally it means that
You are fooling yourself, therefore be sincere and truthful in the spiritual path
When your mind is fully absorbed in the Lord then your duties fully disappear
That shows your full faith in the Lord and so your duties are done the best
By the servants of the Lord and this stage is the final ripened stage
Shankara left His duty of serving the old mother and went for the mission
The mother of Shankara was permanently granted the divine abode of the Lord
May be, she might have faced some temporary inconvenience in her last life
But that is nothing compared to the divine fruit she got from the Lord
See the faith of Shankara on the Lord who left His old mother and He was only
One son to her, she was not helped by anybody since she was abandoned
By her relatives and lives outside the village in a small hut.
You cannot expect that final state to day itself, i.e., the final goal
You must try to reach that goal everyday and try in every minute
Slowly one day or other by the grace of the Lord you will surely reach the goal
This physical world, which consists of the inert objects like Sun, Moon, Stars
Air, Earth etc., is not the world, which is binding you and this is not
The world from which you have to attain the liberation or salvation
If you get salvation from this physical world it is called the death
Death is not the salvation since even after death the bonds bind you
The bonds are not with the physical world but they are with your family members
It is this family that constitutes your entire world from which you must be salvated
The physical world is real and it is unreal for the creator only and not for you
You are a part and parcel of this world and if you say that this world is unreal
You too become unreal, your unreal world is your own family, which is created
By yourself only and why this is unreal? If you analyse, these bonds did not exist
Before this birth and do not exist after this birth and hence are not existing
During this birth also, Shankara told that temporary is always unreal
Therefore, the Gita emphasizes for the detachment from these worldly bonds
Jesus goes one step further and advises you even to hate these family bonds
This is surprising but if you analyze, I should say, He is absolutely correct
If you analyze deeply, these family members deserve your hatred and not love
The reason is that these family members were very vehement enemies to you
In the previous birth you stole their hard earned property and fought with them
Now they have come to collect their wealth from you along with the
Compound interest, they are in the form of wife and children and you are bound
To pay them according to the force of Karma Chakra i.e., associated with Kala Chakra
Payment of loans is Karma Chakra and payment in this birth is Kala Chakra
The same is said “Runanubandha Rupena Pasu Patni Sutalayaah”
The three strongest bonds are with money, wife and children and these three
Are called as “Eeshanaas”, which are the stainless steel chains, which never
Corrode, the secret in the force of these three bonds is only the force of Karma
The Karma is the payment of the loans with interest and for that you have to earn
Therefore, you are forced by Karma to earn the money and that is the spontaneous
Attraction to the money, the Karma is dragging you to earn the money so that
You can pay to your enemies who are surrounding you for the collection of loans
Thus these three bonds are inter related and amalgamated by the force of Karma
These enemies are in the mask of friendship and love with you and you do not
Remember your previous birth, which is again due to the force of karma only
If you remember the previous birth and that enmity you will not repay the loan
Therefore, by the force of Karma Chakra only you do not remember previous birth
These enemies can collect their money only under the mask of love and friendship These enemies are collecting their money in the form of work and also money
The mother repays the loan by doing work like bathing and clothing the children
Such sacrifice of work by the mother is coming under Karma Sanyasa
The father repays the money by giving his hard earned property to the children
And this repayment of direct wealth comes under Karma Phala Tyaga.
But these enemies are not satisfied with simple repayment of their loans
If a thief steals your money and if you catch him, will you leave him
Just by taking your money? You will torture him and then only leave
Similarly, you have stolen their property and you tortured them
Therefore, they have caught the thief in this birth and collect their money
Apart from that they will torture you by dragging you down from the Lord
If you progress in your spiritual path and reach and please the Lord
You are saved permanently and attain eternal happiness here and there
Now these enemies obstruct your spiritual path and drag you back
From that Eternal divine benefit and due to that you will fall in this world-cycle
In this cycle, which is the permanent hell, you are tortured forever
By this, their vengeance is subsided and they stand around you even
In your last minutes so that you will be attracted by them then also
And you will not remember the Lord even in the last minute
This is the reason why all your family members reach you even before your death
They reach you when they hear that you are seriously ill, they are very alert
But you fool! You are not alert about them and remember them only even on the
Death bed! Is your this world not really unreal? You analyse the fact
I say this family world is the most unreal world because these bonds are not only
Unreal according to the analysis of Shankara, but also they are the bonds
Of enmity and so must be hated according to the Holy Jesus
You are thinking the enemy as your friend! How unreal is this bond?
First you come out of this unreal world created by you due to your past deeds
People say often that the world is unreal, yes! It is absolutely unreal
But the world is not this physical world created by the Lord
The unreal world is your family created by yourself due to your past karma
Similarly, your religion is another broader unreal world created by you
Your fellow religious people obstruct you from entering Universal spirituality
Because they are your enemies in the mask of friendship in this birth
You harmed them spiritually in the previous birth and therefore they have come
Now here as your friends belonging to the same religion and revenge upon you
When you come out of these two worlds, which are well and river
You will enter the Universal Spirituality, which is the infinite ocean.
Some people try to get detachment from the family bonds
Without the attachment to the Lord, they can detach from the family
By attaining self through self-analysis but in this case they can get rid of
The worries and misery by attaining the self, which is pure awareness
Such detachment without attachment to the Lord is not permanent.
The attachment to the self is not as strong as the bond with the Lord
Therefore, such people who get only peace by self achievement cannot
Remain in that state for a long time, bliss is stronger than peace
Because God is stronger than the soul, soul gives peace and God gives bliss
Therefore, detachment from the family by attachment with the Lord alone
Is real and final, the scholars get attached to the self by analysis
And think that the self it self is the Lord and they feel that they are the Lord.
These pseudo Advaita Scholars are dragged again by the families and
They are insulted by the Maya and they are shown the reality.
The service to be done to the Lord should not be decided by yourself
You are pleased by doing the service to the Lord as per your desire
Your desire and your pleasure should not be the final goal of the mission
You must do that service, which is desired by the Lord and which pleases Him
His desire and His pleasure should be the final goal of your service
Mere service is not important but the service required by Him is important
Some devotees serve this society to uplift all the human beings
Such social service cannot please the Lord unless He wishes so, without His wish
If you serve the society, that is only to fulfill your desire for the fame
Shankara condemned this concept of social service i.e., Loka Sevaka Matam.
The Lord knows when, whom and where to uplift in this entire world
Whether it is His mission or His personal service, His desire is important
Even in His personal service the angle in which He desires is important
If His hand is paining, what is the use of pressing His legs?
Therefore, at every step the desire, direction and final pleasing of the Lord
Is the only essence and goal of the entire spiritual effort
The Lord alone can protect you and not this world, social service indicates
Your love on your fellow human beings, who constitute a bigger family only.
You have to sacrifice everybody, everything and even every concept for that
He tests you by asking that thing only, which you cannot sacrifice
He always attacks your strongest bond and conducts the test
One test is sufficient because if you can break your strongest bond for the
Sake of the Lord, all the other bonds, which are weaker need not be tested
The sacrifice of strongest bond with any thing other than the Lord alone
Can prove that you have the strongest bond with the Lord only.
You have to cross the family bonds and even the bond with your life
As told by Jesus, Krishna says that you have to cross even Dharma or Justice
For the sake of the Lord because as the protector of justice, He is greater than
The protected justice “Sarva Dharman …” is said in the Gita.
Thus Datta conducts only one test and gives you the final report
You will always try to sacrifice all the weak bonds for His sake
Then you claim that you can sacrifice everything for His sake
The Lord smiles at your talented dramatic action and keeps silent
If you go on still shouting that you are His best devotee, then
He will enter the field and touches your strongest bond or your weakness
You will utterly fail at that point and your mouth is shut forever