October 28th 2025
One of the best students of the science of oneness is Rishi Uddhava. He was completely in tune with Sri Krishna. He had sensed that Sri Krishna was about to become unmanifest and asked Bhagavan if he could go with Him. Sri Krishna shared that ‘you have to be like me to be with me’. To be like Him is ‘Sattva’ and to be with Him is ‘Sat’. Sri Krishna then shared ten facets of his context that can be more saathvik (facets like what you read, what you think etc). One of the critical factors is ‘prajaa’. Prajaaa means citizen in Samskrita, the practical definition is people. But the noun is not as important as the verb. What people ‘do for us’, and what people ‘do to us’ is ‘influencing’. When we are with people who are filled with laziness, what they do for us is they ‘grab’ (they grab our energy, our quietude). When we are with rajasic people (whose influence is filled with aggressiveness), they relate to us not to grab but still to ‘get’. When we revolve around those who are saathvik, filled with quietness, they don’t grab or get, but rather they ‘give’ (they give us energy, quietude, inspiration). Those who are proactive and committed to being in a context like the jnana class, focusing on Manah Shodhanam, we are given energy, given quietude and given purity.
Class 7 was on ‘floating’. So much goodness comes into our life, some are undeserved and some deserved. This goodness particularly makes one a seeker (one who inquires). If we reverse engineer how we became seekers , the first and foremost cause for this is ‘Kripa’. It is on account of God’s grace that we want to know the ‘what and why’ in terms of the big picture of life, and one is not satisfied living mechanically and superficially. A sign that we are feeling the Kripa or grace is that we go with the flow more. The second cause for one to become a seeker (one who inquires into the fundamentals) is ‘Punya’. Punya is when one goes from being an extrovert to being inward looking, one moves closer to the source of joy (which is silence). Mind becomes quieter, intellect becomes still and ego becomes more silent – when we live like this, our inquiry deepens. A tactile way to nurture punya is ‘rightness’. Right action pulls the right attitude, which pulls the right Atma. A sign that one is engaged in their closeness to silence, engaged in rightness is that they don’t have as many dislikes. ‘Freedom is doing what we don’t like’ !
Unless one is following what they have learnt (which leads to purity), we can pile drive our intellect with more knowledge and it will not change us! If we feel that we are infusing ourselves with knowledge for many years and yet we are not changing or transforming the way we need to, then we should pause and appreciate that we are moving very slowly in this course so we can actually feel change.
This Class:
The theme for this class (Class 8) is ‘confusing’. It is confusing when we ‘know’ so much but don’t ‘feel’ so much! What should we do to change or transform?
Verse 4, line 2:
bodhah api jāyate yadvā, tat nishtha na eva sambhavet.
bodhah-knowledge or insights
api- even though
jayate – coming into our life
yadvaa – if this is our case
tannishtaa – but what the knowledge is supposed to develop into, which is to be experienced and established
Na eva sambhavet – it is not happening, it is not our experience and we are still confused
Swamini Vimalananda ji has shared that we are the best student when we are in satsanga. Particularly the sampatti (the 6 special wealths) like the body being calm, mind is quiet, intellect is still – these characteristics are in high order when we are in satsanga. That is why the best practice while in satsanga is ‘shravana’ (active listening).
The way to know we are engaged in active listening or shravana is – we feel that what we just listened to is ‘the message’ that we need in our life. For many, here is where the journey ends even though the journey has not ended. For those who have completed shravana there is a natural evolution to ‘manana’ (active learning). According to our Rishis, the sign that one has checked off manana is – we feel the message is ‘real’. One has less and less doubts. One quality that has to increase inside of us for doubts to decrease is ‘faith’ (shraddha). Through shravana one becomes a believer and through manana one becomes faithful. When we are in satsanga, we have the right context and are hence active listeners. But with faith we should be able to take this outside of the context (outside of satsanga) so the message becomes real through active learning. Natural flow for this is ‘nidhidhyasana’ (active living). Nidhidhyasana means ‘nitaram dhyaihi’ – we comprehensively keep the message which is real with us! The more we remember, the more there is contemplation in our mind. Our Rishis have shared that the sign that one is engaged in Nidhidhyasana is – the message feels real and feels personal. It is for me!
A whole lot of us ‘know of God’ but very few ‘know God’. The former is passive and at the shravana level, the latter is active (gone through manana and nidhidhyasana). A whole lot of us ‘know of happiness’ but very few ‘know happiness’. There is a stark difference between ‘knowing of’ and ‘knowing’. How do we match knowing with feeling ? We should schedule ‘tapa’ into our day. ‘Tapa’ means we are pushing our comfort zone, we are pushing the message to feel more real and personal. When we start to ‘burn’ (tapa) how we used to be, that is a form of ‘shodhana’ or purifying what we think we are. Shodhana is synonymous with punya and the word punya (or merit) comes from ‘punaati’ which means to purify!