(Feb 6,2014) Spiritual Message for the Day – Be Aware of Your All-Pervasive Nature by Swami Krishnananda

Be Aware of your All-Pervasive Nature
From particular to the Universal – This Brahman is What I Am

Divine Life Society Publication: Sandilya Vidya by Swami Krishnananda

Dādau brahmāhamasmītyanubhava udite khalvidah brahma pascat, is a passage from Acharya Sankara’s ‘Satasloki’ wherein he makes a reference to Sandilya vidya. He mentions how the consciousness rises gradually from the level of individual perspective to the universal one. It is not easy to understand because of the fact that we cannot distinguish between our personality or individuality and the Atman, to which reference is being made. We always mix up the two. The Atman is myself, and we know very well what we understand by the word ‘myself’. It is an inveterate habit of the mind to think in terms of the body. So, whatever be the thing that is associated with individuality is at once identified in meditation. The kernel that is within us, the essence that we are, is to be separated from the body that we appear to be in this technique of meditation. In the beginning, there is consciousness that one’s own self is all. Now, this is not merely a statement that is to be studied grammatically or linguistically, but is a matter of experience. One’s location in all things in addition to one’s own body becomes a revealed truth in the advanced stages of this meditation.

It is something like the space within a vessel realizing that it is everywhere. Just compare yourself to a little space that is contained in a small glass tumbler which has got obsessed with a notion that it is inside the glass tumbler only and that what is outside as space is not itself, but an object of itself – something external to itself. It has to elevate itself to the awareness of the non-distinguishability between itself and the external space. I am the all! The space within the vessel realizes that it is all-space. It does not mean that it has become all-space by any effort of its imagination or activity. It is just a rising to the awareness that the wall around it, namely, the tumbler or the glass, is not going to limit its all-pervasive nature.

Then the realization comes – khalvidah brahma pascat. It is not merely the ‘I’ that has become all, but every one is the same all. The Self that is in me is not in me only. The assertion, “aham brahmasmi – I am Brahman” can be made by each center of individuality in a similar manner. This is a larger realization, says Sankara. It is a rise from the limitation of one’s individuality upto the cosmic Reality of one’s essence, with a simultaneous awareness of the identity of every self, the so-called multiplicity of selves, with this single Self. So it is the total of all the selves in an indistinguishable mass rising to a single comprehension of the great Absolute Brahman. This is the actual inner import of the meditation which is called Sandilya Vidya.

Excerpts from:

Be Aware of your All-Pervasive Nature – Sandilya Vidya by Swami Krishnananda

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(Sep 27,2013) Spiritual Message for the Day – Sandilya-Vidya

 Sandilya Vidya

Divine Life Society Publication: Appendix 1-Sandilya Vidya –Chhandogya Upanishad by Swami Krishnananda

 

Hari Om. Om Sat-Guru-Paramatmane Namah.

Sandilya, the great Rishi, had this revelation of the Supreme Being. Vidya is a meditation, an art of thinking on the Supreme goal. This meditation begins with the proclamation of the all-comprehensiveness of Brahman: "Sarvam khalvidam brahma—All this is verily Brahman." This vidya is contained in Section 14 of Chapter Three of the Upanishad.

Sarvam khalvidam brahma, tajjalaniti santa upasita, atha khalu kratumayah puruso yatha-kratur-asmin-loke puruso bhavati tathetah pretya bhavati, sa kratum kurvita.

This is a very famous passage in the Upanishad. This is how we have to meditate, calmly, quietly and peacefully. We have to meditate that everything comes from That, everything is sustained in That, and everything returns to That. That which is the origination, the sustenance and the dissolution of all things is this Brahman. Inasmuch as it is the cause of all things, naturally, every effect in the form of this creation is contained there. We too are effects of creation. So, we too are contained in it.

There is a great justification in the assertion that everything is the Supreme Being. Logically and naturally, when the effects are all contained in the cause, one should be able to appreciate the all-comprehensiveness of the ultimate cause. This cause only is, inasmuch as no effect can be separated from the cause. There is an undifferentiated relationship between the effect and the cause. There is no gap between the one and the other. We are, therefore, not isolated from the cause. There is no vital cut or gulf between this universe of effect and its cause which is Brahman. This means to say that even now we are vitally connected with the Absolute. We are maintaining even at this moment an organic relationship.

The difficult part of this meditation is that we ourselves, as thinkers, are associated vitally and organically with the Supreme Being on whom we have to meditate. We cannot think like this. For, the mind refuses to think. We can think something outside us and we can think of the whole universe practically, but we cannot think something in which we ourselves are involved, because there it is that the mind finds itself incapable of functioning. There is no such thing as mind thinking itself.

Aristotle said that God is thought thinking itself. It is very difficult to understand what it means. How can thought think itself? It always thinks something else. So, Brahman cannot be thought by the mind, and yet this is the injunction of the Upanishad. The highest kind of meditation is sarvam khalvidam brahma. All this manifestation which you see in the form of individuality, whether organic or inorganic, visible or invisible, wherever it be, is That. Nothing but That is.

Again to reiterate, the most difficult thing to swallow here is that we ourselves are a part of That. The meditator is part of that which is meditated on. How is one to even think? It requires a tremendous psychological preparation and an extraordinary type of purity of mind to appreciate what this instruction is. This is not an ordinary type of meditation. It is most extraordinary in the sense that you are contemplating yourself, as it were, and not something or somebody else. That is implied in the statement that everything is included in That, not excluding oneself who meditates.

Thus should you meditate: "Sarvam khalvidam brahma—all this verily is the Supreme Absolute Brahman." How do you contemplate Brahman? The whole universe—you can imagine what the universe could be—has come from That. It has not come from That as something different from That. The very substance of this creation is the substance of the Absolute. That is one aspect of the matter. The other aspect is that there is no disconnection between the effect and the cause. So you can imagine how hard it is to entertain this thought. Everything is That because of the effect being non-disassociated from the cause. It is connected with the cause. It is sustained, even now at the time of the apparent creation, in That only and it will go back to That. So there is no place for anything to exist except That. Also, there is nothing other than That. Thus, one should meditate.

The word kratuh has several meanings. It means an effort of the will, an action of the mind, a determination of the understanding and a meditation that you practice. All this meaning is comprehended by the word kratuh. The whole of one's life is nothing but a determination or willing in this manner. Throughout our life we will in some way or other. The individual is an embodiment of action performed through his will. And whatever we will, that we become, because of the intensity of the will. As we affirm, so we experience and that we become. Our experiences are nothing but our affirmations through will. We have affirmed something very intensely in our previous lives, and the reward of those affirmations is the present series of experiences we are passing through here. So this is a caution, again administered to us. Inasmuch as whatever we think intensely and continuously, and that we are going to become, what should we think throughout our life if we want to become Brahman? We want to become the Absolute Itself. What should be the kind of thought that we should entertain? What should be the type of affirmation that we should make? How should our will work? This need not be explained further, because it is obvious. Therefore, my dear readers, spend your time in absorption of your thought in Brahman. This should be your meditation throughout your life. The Upanishad gives some further details as to how we should conduct this meditation in our life.

Excerpts from:

Sandilya Vidya –Chhandogya Upanishad by Swami Krishnananda

 

If you would like to purchase the print edition, visit:
http://www.dlshq.org/cgi-bin/store/commerce.cgi?

If you would like to contribute to the dissemination of spiritual knowledge please contact the General Secretary at:

generalsecretary@sivanandaonline.org