Look Within – Talks on the Bhagavad Gita by Swami Venkatesananda.

[Guest guest]

There was a great saint in India called Pattinattar –

 

One day he was cremating the body of his own mother and as the body was

burning, he looked at it and sang a very beautiful song describing the

whole biography of a person, right from conception to cremation. The

whole song concludes and he folds his palms and prays to the lord;

 

" This woman is dead and now there is no handful of ashes – that

is all the body which I called mother; and I, who am in this body, think

`this is I – I am this body, and all my pleasures, misery,

ambitions and activities are centred in this – what a fool I am, if

this is all. Please save me from this ignorance " .

 

For a long time I used to think `a hand full of ashes' was a

figure of speech until one day I visited a crematorium and was told that

– that is quite true – after cremation, there is barely a

handful of ashes.

 

Then I realised that we are nothing but water – we are actually

swimming, even now.

 

There is this cosmic ocean, and we are all swimming – may be one or

two cells are real in this body.

 

So, when I look at that I realise that the body comes and goes.

 

It's not `I' but something else. And yet, if someone comes

and hits me, it is unmistakable – I feel pain.

 

The body is made of food – bananas – and if I hit myself I feel

the pain, but if I hit a banana, the banana doesn't feel pain.

 

So there is some kind of mystery here! When I say " what am I? What

am I made of? " there is no straight forward answer.

 

I also see that there is some relationship between the world outside and

the body. The body come out of earth, and returns to it – there is a

cycle which is kept constantly.

 

So we are all recycled cabbages, and the cabbages are all recycled

swamis!

 

You may not have the opportunity to bury me, but it does happen and some

kind of roses or something are grown on top, when you look at that, you

think " this fellow was a swami some time ago " !!!

 

It's all recycling. We think we have invented this

`recycling' few years ago, but it has been going on from

eternity.

 

There is a certain correspondence between the earth and the body, but as

I said, when the banana is beaten, it doesn't weep or wail (at least

to my hearing) but when swami banana is beaten, it is painful.

 

So there is something more in this.

To be continued..