True Renunciation
Easily do we mistake the
principle of vairagya, the great
discrimination. So many sadhus are
there, so many vairagis are
there, who have renounced everything. You may ask a vairagi: what are the things that you have renounced?
The immediate, quick reply may
be: "I possess nothing. I have left everything that I had earlier. I have
left the world; therefore, I have completed my renunciation."
Standing on the ground that is
the earth, you are saying that you have renounced it. The world blows a breeze
of various types on your personality every moment, saying that you cannot
renounce the world, unless you renounce yourself first, so that the
renunciation may become complete.
But where is the meaning in
renouncing one's own self? If the self is renounced, what remains? This
difficulty will suddenly take possession of our own selves. There is really no
such thing as renunciation of anything, because nothing in the world really
belongs to you. How can you renounce a thing which has not actually become your
property? Are you renouncing somebody else's belongings? The world is not under
your control; therefore, how will you renounce it?
Here, renunciation has to be
understood in the spirit that is within it. Renunciation is not an abandonment
in the literal sense of the word, but a spirit that is maintained within – a
spirit of not belonging to anything, and a spirit of nothing actually belonging
to one's own self. In this process of the determination of the spirit, the
world stands united with you because of the fact that you are made of the same
substance as the world of nature.
All humanity is inside you,
with you, within you, and has taken possession of you. The principle of every
individual in the world is inside you also, so that on different occasions you
can manifest the character of any person in this world.
We cannot think in this manner
because our education is purely empirical, outwardly motivated, and physically
conditioned. But you stand a master of all things by renunciation, in the sense
of belonging to the whole world – the world belonging to you, and you yourself
belonging to the world. The world stands renounced within itself. You become a
world individual. Such renunciates are world masters, because they are self-masters.
When the taste for things ceases, you have conquered the world.
Can any one of you feel
convinced within yourself that you are a world individual? "I do not
merely belong to the world; nor the world belongs to me. I will stand as a
meeting point of the world and the individuality of everybody."
Unthinkable is this situation. A master-mind we call such people; a super-man,
an incarnation, an avatara – all
sorts of names and nomenclatures are attributed to such achievements in a
person who ceases to be a person and is at the same time a super-person.
Such renunciation precedes the
understanding that is required to practise yoga, which is real sadhana.
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