THE DAYS OF OUR LIVES

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--- On Mon, 17/8/09, Swami Sadasivananda <sadasivananda wrote:

 

 

THE DAYS OF OUR LIVES

The following is an excerpt from the book 'My Life and Quest', by Arthur Osborne, a direct disciple of Sri Ramana Maharshi. Sat-Chit-Ananda the true state is called — Being-Consciousness-Bliss. Ultimately they fuse into One; in fact they are three aspects of the same. There was already the experience of being and the impersonal awareness, but not the bliss which should draw the mind of its own volition to this state and make it abide there effortlessly, over-riding any counter-attraction that might seek to draw it outwards. There are cases, on a devotional and ecstatic path, where the aspect of bliss

develops first. Despite the intense joy, this is more dangerous and less satisfactory. The times of joy are interspersed with periods of black misery when the Face of the Beloved is veiled; moreover the violent alternation and passionate longing may induce irrational behaviour or even over-balance the mind. Therefore, for instance, it is a dictum of the Sufi masters that the path of sobriety is preferable to that of inebriation. Even so powerful a master as Ramakrishna was thought mad when he first became immersed in ecstasy. At this stage I had a sudden impulse to be afraid and draw back. This is a temptation which must be unhesitatingly cast aside or it may vitiate a lifetime’s striving. It is as though a man were to toil through dense forest and craggy mountain, in hardship and frequent danger, seeking the heavenly city, and then, when its outer ramparts at last loom up, separated from him only by a narrow chasm, were to turn aside, fearing to

jump. Henceforth he sits listlessly by the wayside or wanders without aim, unable to return to the state of spiritual ignorance from which he started but without initiative to press forward. There are many such derelicts.

 

 

There is a tide in the affairs of men, Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;Omitted, all the voyage of their lifeIs bound in shallows and in miseries.On such a full sea we are now afloat;And we must take the current when it serves,Or lose our venture.— Shakespeare, Julius

Caesar, act 4, scene 3 However, it should be added that this depressing prospect (who are called but not chosen) is depressing only from the narrow viewpoint of this lifetime. Actually, a man’s whole course or life-sequence is a journey leading through however many twists and turns, ravines and bare hillsides, marshy jungles and thirsty plains, to the goal of supreme bliss that is his true nature. It is a pilgrimage lasting many days, each day being one lifetime. A whole day may be wasted; a man may scramble down the hillside after gleaming berries that turn out sour or poisonous when plucked, or he may play around and reach no shelter by nightfall. But the path remains, ineluctable. He has only made the next day’s journey more arduous. The discovery that life is a

pilgrimage, that it has a goal and therefore a meaning, is an immense blessing, but it does not necessarily mean that the goal will be attained in this lifetime. The number of days still required would depend partly on the distance from the goal, partly on the energy with which the pilgrim presses forward. Such advance as he does make is not wasted, even though he grows tired and relaxes his efforts before the end of the day. He will wake up so much further forward for the next day’s journey. This is expressly guaranteed in the Bhagavad Gita: “He who fell from yoga is born (again) in a pure and fortunate house. Or he even comes into a family of wise yogis, though a birth such as this is very hard to obtain in this world. There he obtains the buddhic attainments of his previous incarnations, and thence he again strives for full accomplishment†(Ch. 6, v. 40-43, trans. Ernest Wood).

 

 

 

 

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