Mere knowledge through words will not bring realization- Enjoy the misery

[dattaswami]

Mere knowledge through words will not bring realization- Enjoy the misery

 

You are trying to remove the problems but the problems are only your real friends in the spiritual line. The constant existence of problems will activate you and suppress your egoism creating a favorable atmosphere for the devotion to God. The happiness will make you proud and lazy and you will be deviated from the spiritual line. Therefore scholars like to enjoy the problems which are the guiding forces in the spiritual line. Kunti asked for existence of problems continuously as a boon from Krishna. The real tears will come in misery only while praying the God. This human life is obtained as rare chance after a long time of passing through several lives of animals. Thus the animal nature is concentrated in us and the constant presence of beating stick is necessary for us to grow in the right spiritual path. Mere knowledge through words will not bring realization.

 

From this point also avoiding the enjoyment of punishments is also not correct for the spiritual progress. The realized soul invites difficulties for the sake of spiritual progress. An ignorant soul tries to avoid the difficulties and invites happiness by praying God. God brings back the results of good deeds arranged in the future life cycles with reduced value like a pre-matured deposit. By this the future cycle becomes full of misery only. Sometimes we find people who are hit with misery from birth to death. These were the people who pressed God for happiness and their happiness of previous births was the fruits of good deeds drawn from the present life cycle. God arranges every human life with alternating fruits of good and bad deeds like meals with alternating sweet and hot dishes. A liberated soul invites both happiness and misery in alternating way for full entertainment.

 

The happiness derived from such entertainment is continuous and is called as Ananda. Nanda means happiness. The letter ‘A’ before Nanda means continuity (Aasamantaat). The word Sukham denotes happiness which is always temporary. It disappears when misery appears. But Ananda is continuous happiness, if you can enjoy the misery also like a hot dish. A spiritual aspirant who aims at the grace of God wants to perform penance which is a rigorous Saadhana. While doing penance you create difficulties artificially by litting the fire around you. This means spiritual aspirant wants continuous misery as the guiding force.

 

The happiness and richness induce egoism and inertness which are obstacles of spiritual Saadhana. You will wonder to hear the special worship performed by Me sometime back in which I uttered the Sankalpa which states that I should get severe difficulties and poverty so that Jnana, Bhakti and Vairagya (spiritual knowledge, devotion and detachment) will improve in Me. Thus if you are a realized soul, you will invite difficulties as your spiritual guru. If you are a liberated soul you will invite both for entertainment. If you go to a picture, you like to see scenes of both happiness and misery. When you take meals you like both sweet and hot dishes. Then why are you not inviting both misery and happiness in your life for entertainment? The entire creation created by God for entertainment is a mixture of day & night, summer & winter, birth & death, happiness & misery etc. The equality in the entertainment of both is called as Yoga according to the Gita (samatvam yoga uchyate).