Aparokshanubhuti

… the Shruti says, "विज्ञातारमरे केन विजानीयात् -- well, through what means is that to be known which is the Knower?"

 Whatever you know, you know through the instrumentality of your mind. But mind is something material. It is active only because there is the pure Self behind it. 
So, how can you know that Self through your mind? 
But this only becomes known, after all, that the mind cannot reach the pure Self, no, nor even the intellect. 

Our relative knowledge ends just there. Then, when the mind is free from activity or functioning, it vanishes, and the Self is revealed. This state has been described by the commentator Shankara as अपरोक्षानुभूति: or supersensuous perception. 

                - Swami Vivekananda, 
                   Conversations and Dialogues, 
                     recorded by Sharat Chandra Chakravarty  

Three Things for Greatness

Surest Way of Reform

The last and highest manifestation of Prana is love. The moment you have succeeded in manufacturing love out of Prana, you are free. 
It is the hardest and the greatest thing to gain. 

You must not criticise others; you must criticise yourself. If you see a drunkard, do not criticise him; remember he is you in another shape. He who has not darkness sees no darkness in others. What you have inside you is that you see in others. This is the surest way of reform. 

If the would-be reformers who criticise and see evil would themselves stop creating evil, the world would be better. 
Beat this idea into yourself. 

                   - Swami Vivekananda, 
                       ‘Lessons on Raja-Yoga’, 
                         Class Notes in England 

Supreme Science

Institution of Monks

Disciple: But, sir, how many monks are to be found who are truly devoted to the good of men?

Swamiji: Ah, quite enough if one great Sannyasin like Shri Ramakrishna comes in a thousand years! 
For a thousand years after his advent, people may well guide themselves by those ideas and ideals he leaves behind. 

It is only because this monastic institution exists in the country that men of his greatness are born here. There are defects, more or less, in all the institutions of life. But what is the reason that in spite of its faults, this noble institution stands yet supreme over all the other institutions of life? 
It is because the true Sannyasins forgo even their own liberation and live simply for doing good to the world. 

If you don't feel grateful to such a noble institution, fie on you again and again!

               - Swami Vivekananda, 
                  Conversations and Dialogues, 
                    recorded by Sharat Chandra Chakravarty  

Infinite Mine of Spirituality

Scriptures are Maps

Realisation of religion is the only way. Each one of us will have to discover. Of what use are these books, then, these Bibles of the world? 
They are of great use, just as maps are of a country. I have seen maps of England all my life before I came here, they were great helps to me in forming some sort of conception of England. Yet, when I arrived in this country, what a difference between the maps and the country itself! 

So is the difference between realisation and scriptures. These books are only the maps, the experiences of past men, as a motive power to us to dare to make the same experiences and discover in the same way, if not better. 

               - Swami Vivekananda, 
                  ‘Methods and Purpose of Religion’ - 
                     Talk in England

Body - Dwelling Place of Jivatman

Civilized Society

The more advanced a society or nation is in spirituality, the more is that society or nation civilised. 
No nation can be said to have become civilised only because it has succeeded in increasing the comforts of material life by bringing into use lots of machinery and things of that sort. 

The present-day civilisation of the West is multiplying day by day only the wants and distresses of men. On the other hand, the ancient Indian civilisation, by showing people the way to spiritual advancement, doubtless succeeded, if not in removing once for all, at least in lessening, in a great measure, the material needs of men. 

                  - Swami Vivekananda, 
                     Conversations and Dialogues, 
                       recorded by Sharat Chandra Chakravarty  

Objectified God

Goodness, Purity

Believe in Yourself

Gold of Mind

When you think upon a problem, there is no sense-enjoyment there, but [the] exquisite delight of thought. . . . 
It is that that makes the man. . . . 
Take one great idea! It deepens. Concentration comes. You no longer feel your body. Your senses have stopped. You are above all physical senses. 

All that was manifesting itself through the senses is concentrated upon that one idea. That moment you are higher than the animal. You get the revelation none can take from you -- a direct perception of something higher than the body. . . . 
Therein is the gold of mind, not upon the plane of the senses. 

            - Swami Vivekananda, 
               ‘Formal Worship’ – Talk in California

Love, Sincerity, Patience

Body

[From the worldly standpoint,] my all is this body. My world is this body. My God is this body. I am the body. 
If you pinch me, I am pinched. I forget God the moment I have a headache. I am the body! 
God and everything must come down for this highest goal -- the body. 

From this standpoint, when Christ died on the cross and did not bring angels [to his aid], he was a fool. He ought to have brought down angels and gotten himself off the cross! 
But from the standpoint of the lover, to whom this body is nothing, who cares for this nonsense? Why bother thinking about this body that comes and goes? 
There is no more to it than the piece of cloth the Roman soldiers cast lots for. 

              - Swami Vivekananda, 
                 ‘Divine Love’ – Talk in California

Foundation of India's Being - Renunciation

Search for Bliss

That Supreme Bliss fully exists in all, from Brahma down to the blade of grass. You are also that undivided Brahman. 
This very moment you can realise if you think yourself truly and absolutely to be so. 
It is all mere want of direct perception. 

That you have taken service and work so hard for the sake of your wife also shows that the aim is ultimately to attain to that Supreme Bliss of Brahman. Being again and again entangled in the intricate maze of delusion and hard hit by sorrows and afflictions, the eye will turn of itself to one's own real nature, the Inner Self. 

It is owing to the presence of this desire for bliss in the heart, that man, getting hard shocks one after another, turns his eye inwards -- to his own Self. A time is sure to come to everyone, without exception, when he will do so -- to one it may be in this life, to another, after thousands of incarnations. 

                - Swami Vivekananda, 
                  Conversations and Dialogues, 
                    recorded by Sharat Chandra Chakravarty

Immortality by Renunciation Alone

Die for an Ideal

Go, all of you, wherever there is an outbreak of plague or famine, or wherever the people are in distress, and mitigate their sufferings. 
At the most you may die in the attempt -- what of that? 

How many like you are being born and dying like worms every day? What difference does that make to the world at large? 
Die you must, but have a great ideal to die for, and it is better to die with a great ideal in life. 

Preach this ideal from door to door, and you will yourselves be benefited by it at the same time that you are doing good to your country. On you lie the future hopes of our country. 
I feel extreme pain to see you leading a life of inaction. 

Set yourselves to work -- to work! Do not tarry -- the time of death is approaching day by day! Do not sit idle, thinking that everything will be done in time, later on! Mind -- nothing will be done that way! 

                 - Swami Vivekananda, 
                     Conversations and Dialogues, 
                      recorded by Sharat Chandra Chakravarty  

Real Backbone of Hinduism

Gross and Subtle

Facts, naked facts, gaunt and terrible may be; 
truth, bare truth, though its vibrations may snap every chord of the heart; 
motive selfless and sincere, though to reach it, limb after limb has to be lopped off -- 
such are to be arrived at, found, and gained, before the mind on the lower plane of activity can raise huge work-waves. 

The fine accumulates round itself the gross as it rolls on through time and becomes manifest, the unseen crystallizes into the seen, the possible becomes the practical, the cause the effect, and thought, muscular work. 

                       - Swami Vivekananda, 
                         ‘Sketch of The Life of Pavhari Baba’  

Om Tat Sat

Sat-Chit-Ananda

Disciple: Then what you call love is the same as supreme knowledge?

Swamiji: Exactly so. Realisation of love comes to none unless one becomes a perfect Jnani. Does not the Vedanta say that Brahman is Sat- chit-ananda -- the absolute Existence - knowledge - bliss?

Disciple: Yes, sir.

Swamiji: The phrase Sat-chit-ananda means -- Sat, i.e. existence, Chit, i.e. consciousness or knowledge, and Ananda, i.e. bliss which is the same as love. There is no controversy between the Bhakta and the Jnani regarding the Sat aspect of Brahman. Only, the Jnanis lay greater stress on His aspect of Chit or knowledge, while the Bhaktas keep the aspect of Ananda or love more in view. 
But no sooner is the essence of Chit realised than the essence of Ananda is also realised. Because what is Chit is verily the same as Ananda. 

               -  Swami Vivekananda, 
                    Conversations and Dialogues, 
                       recorded by Sharat Chandra Chakravarty

Hindu and Westerner

Ethics and Morality

Q.-- How does the Vedanta explain individuality and ethics?

A.-- The real individual is the Absolute; this personalization is through Maya. It is only apparent; in reality it is always the Absolute. 
In reality there is one, but in Maya it is appearing as many. In Maya there is this variation. Yet even in this Maya there is always the tendency to get back to the One, as expressed in all ethics and all morality of every nation, because it is the constitutional necessity of the soul. 
It is finding its oneness; and this struggle to find this oneness is what we call ethics and morality. Therefore we must always practice them. 

                    - Swami Vivekananda,
                        Q & A at Graduate Philosophical Society 
                         of Harvard University on March 25, 1896 

Mother of Strength

Roughest and Steepest Road

Great work requires great and persistent effort for a long time. Neither need we trouble ourselves if a few fail. 

It is in the nature of things that many should fall, that troubles should come, that tremendous difficulties should arise, that selfishness and all the other devils in the human heart should struggle hard when they are about to be driven out by the fire of spirituality. 

The road to the Good is the roughest and steepest in the universe. It is a wonder that so many succeed, no wonder that so many fall. 

Character has to be established through a thousand stumbles. 

                  - Swami Vivekananda, 

                     in a Letter to J J Goodwin 

                      from Switzerland (August 1896)

Stain of Jealousy

Veg - Non-Veg

For him surely is a strict vegetarian diet whose one end is to lead solely a spiritual life. 
But he who has to steer the boat of his life with strenuous labour through the constant life-and-death struggles and the competition of this world must of necessity take meat. 

So long as there will be in human society such a thing as the triumph of the strong over the weak, animal food is required, or some other suitable substitute for it has to be discovered; 
otherwise, the weak will naturally be crushed under the feet of the strong. 

It will not do to quote solitary instances of the good effect of vegetable food on some particular person or persons: compare one nation with another and then draw conclusions. 

                  - Swami Vivekananda, 
                    The East and The West

Ignorance, Inequality, and Desire

Unnecessary Impatience

We have not the patience to go and work our way out. 
For instance, there is a fire in a theatre, and only a few escape. The rest in trying to rush out crush one another down. 
That crush was not necessary for the salvation of the building nor of the two or three who escaped. 
If all had gone out slowly, not one would have been hurt. 

That is the case in life. 

The doors are open for us, and we can all get out without the competition and struggle; and yet we struggle. The struggle we create through our own ignorance, through impatience; we are in too great a hurry. 
The highest manifestation of strength is to keep ourselves calm and on our own feet. 

                   - Swami Vivekananda, 
                      Evolution, Notes from Lectures and Discourses 

Do and Die

De-hypnotise Yourself

Q.-- I should like to ask, in continuation of Professor ----'s question, whether you know of any people who have made any study of the principles of self-hypnotism, which they undoubtedly practised to a great extent in ancient India, and what has been recently stated and practised in that thing. 
Of course you do not have it so much in modern India.

A.-- What you call hypnotism in the West is only a part of the real thing. The Hindus call it self-hypnotisation. 
They say you are hypnotised already, and that you should get out of it and de-hypnotise yourself. 
"There the sun cannot illumine, nor the moon, nor the stars; the flash of lightning cannot illumine that; what to speak of this mortal fire! That shining, everything else shines" (Katha Upanishad, II.ii.15). 
That is not hypnotisation, but de-hypnotisation. 

We say that every other religion that preaches these things as real is practising a form of hypnotism. It is the Advaitist alone that does not care to be hypnotised. His is the only system that more or less understands that hypnotism comes with every form of dualism. 
But the Advaitist says, throw away even the Vedas, throw away even the Personal God, throw away even the universe, throw away even your own body and mind, and let nothing remain, in order to get rid of hypnotism perfectly. 

"From where the mind comes back with speech, being unable to reach, knowing the Bliss of Brahman, no more is fear." 
That is de-hypnotisation. 
"I have neither vice nor virtue, nor misery nor happiness; I care neither for the Vedas nor sacrifices nor ceremonies; I am neither food nor eating nor eater, for I am Existence Absolute, Knowledge Absolute, Bliss Absolute; I am He, I am He." 

We know all about hypnotism. We have a psychology which the West is just beginning to know, but not yet adequately, I am sorry to say. 

                - Swami Vivekananda, 
                   Q & A at Graduate Philosophical Society 
                     of Harvard University on March 25, 1896 

Helping Others

Our Play is Done

When the baby is at play, she will not come even if called by her mother. But when she finishes her play, she will rush to her mother, and will have no play. 

So there come moments in our life, when we feel our play is finished, and we want to rush to the Mother. Then all our toil here will be of no value; men, women, and children -- wealth, name, and fame, joys and glories of life -- punishments and successes -- will be no more, and the whole life will seem like a show. 

We shall see only the infinite rhythm going on, endless and purposeless, going we do not know where. Only this much shall we say; our play is done. 

                 - Swami Vivekananda, 
                    Sadhanas or Preparations for Higher Life, 
                    Notes from Lectures and Discourses 

Secret of Religion

Infilling of Nature

Our [Indian] theory of evolution and of Akasha and Prana is exactly what your [Western] modern philosophies have. 
Your belief in evolution is among our Yogis and in the Sankhya philosophy. 

For instance, Patanjali speaks of one species being changed into another by the infilling of nature --"जात्यन्तरपरिणाम: प्रकृत्यापूरात्"; only he differs from you in the explanation. 
His explanation of this evolution is spiritual. He says that just as when a farmer wants to water his field from the canals that pass near, he has only to lift up his gate --"निमित्तमप्रयोजकं प्रकृतीनां वरणभेदस्तु तत: क्षेत्रिकवत्"-- so each man is the Infinite already, only these bars and bolts and different circumstances shut him in; 
but as soon as they are removed, he rushes out and expresses himself. 

                      - Swami Vivekananda, 
                         Q & A at Graduate Philosophical Society 
                         of Harvard University on March 25, 1896 

Perfect Freedom

Ishvara and Brahman

In reply to a question as to the exact position of Ishvara in Vedantic Philosophy, the Swami Vivekananda, while in Europe, gave the following definition:

"Ishvara is the sum total of individuals, yet He is an Individual, as the human body is a unit, of which each cell is an individual. 
Samashti or collected equals God; Vyashti or analysed equals the Jiva. The existence of Ishvara, therefore, depends on that of Jiva, as the body on the cell, and vice versa. 
Thus, Jiva and Ishvara are coexistent beings; when one exists, the other must. 

Also, because, except on our earth, in all the higher spheres, the amount of good being vastly in excess of the amount of evil, the sum total (Ishvara) may be said to be all-good.
Omnipotence and omniscience are obvious qualities and need no argument to prove from the very fact of totality. 

Brahman is beyond both these and is not a conditioned state; it is the only Unit not composed of many units, the principle which runs through all from a cell to God, without which nothing can exist; and whatever is real is that principle, or Brahman. 
When I think I am Brahman, I alone exist; so with others. 
Therefore, each one is the whole of that principle." 

                  - Swami Vivekananda, 
                      Ishvara and Brahman, 
                       Notes from Lectures and Discourses 

Kindergartens of Meditation

The Sannyasin

When a man has fulfilled the duties and obligations of that stage of life in which he is born, and 
his aspirations lead him to seek a spiritual life and to abandon altogether the worldly pursuits of possession, fame, or power, 
when, by the growth of insight into the nature of the world, he sees its impermanence, its strife, its misery, and the paltry nature of its prizes, and turns away from all these -- 
then he seeks the True, the Eternal Love, the Refuge. 

He makes complete renunciation (Sannyasa) of all worldly position, property, and name, and wanders forth into the world to live a life of self-sacrifice and to persistently seek spiritual knowledge, striving to excel in love and compassion and to acquire lasting insight. 

Gaining these pearls of wisdom by years of meditation, discipline, and inquiry, he in his turn becomes a teacher and hands on to disciples, lay or professed, who may seek them from him, all that he can of wisdom and beneficence.

A Sannyasin cannot belong to any religion, for his is a life of independent thought, which draws from all religions; his is a life of realisation, not merely of theory or belief, much less of dogma. 

                - Swami Vivekananda, 
                   The Sannyasin, 
                    Notes from Lectures and Discourses 

Blasphemy Against God

Great Painter

No breathing, no physical training of Yoga, nothing is of any use until you reach to the idea, "I am the Witness." 
Say, when the tyrant hand is on your neck, "I am the Witness! I am the Witness!" Say, "I am the Spirit! 
Nothing external can touch me." 

When evil thoughts arise, repeat that, give that sledge-hammer blow on their heads, "I am the Spirit! I am the Witness, the Ever-blessed! I have no reason to do, no reason to suffer, I have finished with everything, I am the Witness. 
I am in my picture gallery -- this universe is my museum, 
I am looking at these successive paintings. They are all beautiful. Whether good or evil. I see the marvellous skill, but it is all one. 
Infinite flames of the Great Painter!" 

                    - Swami Vivekananda, 
                       Sadhanas or Preparations for Higher Life, 
                       Notes from Lectures and Discourses

Problem of Monotheism

Mass of Namby-Pamby Nonsense

We are like cattle driven to the slaughter-house -- hastily nibbling a bite of grass on the roadside as they are driven along under the whip. 
And all this is our work, our fear -- fear, the beginning of misery, of disease, etc. 

By being nervous and fearful we injure others. By being so fearful to hurt we hurt more. By trying so much to avoid evil we fall into its jaws.
What a mass of namby-pamby nonsense we create round ourselves!! It does us no good, it leads us on to the very thing we try to avoid -- misery. . . .

Oh, to become fearless, to be daring, to be careless of everything! . . 

                  - Swami Vivekananda, 
                       in a Letter to Sister Nivedita 
                        from San Francisco (March 1900)

True Civilisation

Goldness of Gold

“Silver and gold", …, "have I none; but such as I have give I thee" freely, and 
that is the knowledge that the goldness of gold, 
the silverness of silver, the manhood of man, 
the womanhood of woman, 
the reality of everything is the Lord -- and 
that this Lord we are trying to realise from time without beginning in the objective, and in the attempt throwing up such "queer" creatures of our fancy as man, woman, child, body, mind, the earth, sun, moon, stars, the world, love, hate, property, wealth, etc.; also ghosts, devils, angels and gods, God etc. 

                   - Swami Vivekananda, 
                        in a Letter to Mary Hale 
                          from London (November 1896)

What is Education

March On!

There is nothing that is absolutely evil. The devil has a place here as well as God, else he would not be here. 
Just as I told you, it is through Hell that we pass to Heaven. 
Our mistakes have places here. 

Go on! Do not look back if you think you have done something that is not right. Now, do you believe you could be what you are today, had you not made those mistakes before? Bless your mistakes, then. They have been angels unawares. Blessed be torture! Blessed be happiness! 

Do not care what be your lot. Hold on to the ideal. 
March on! 
Do not look back upon little mistakes and things. In this battlefield of ours, the dust of mistakes must be raised. Those who are so thin-skinned that they cannot bear the dust, let them get out of the ranks. 

                  - Swami Vivekananda, 
                     Sadhanas or Preparations for Higher Life, 
                     Notes from Lectures and Discourses

Beyond Birth and Death