Month: February 2020

The Practical Application of Vedanta

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Q: What is the practical application of Advaita Vedanta in everyday life?

A:  The conclusion of Advaita Vedanta is: Brahman alone is real; the individual person you think you are is illusory; the essence (true nature) of the illusory person is brahman; therefore, you are brahman.

What is brahman?  Immortal, unchanging, limitless, self-existent consciousness. As such, it does not suffer when the body and mind suffer.

So what is the practical application of knowing that you’re brahman?  Well, when you’ve realized the truth of Vedanta for yourself (that you are brahman), the illusory world doesn’t suddenly disappear. It continues on just as before.

But the difference is that instead of going about your life riddled with the anxiety caused by believing that you’re the body-mind, you can live your life knowing that no matter what happens to the body-mind, you are always completely okay (because you are really brahman, not the body-mind). When this is clear, you no longer have to rely on the state of the body-mind (or it’s external circumstances) for security and peace of mind. You understand that as brahman, security and peace are your very nature (insofar as you are ever-present, unchanging and undisturbed by the world).  Bringing this knowledge to the forefront of your mind when you’re presented with life’s difficulties is the practical “application” of the self-knowledge gained from Advaita Vedanta.

All my best – Vishnudeva

 

Steady Wisdom: Day 60

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Steady Wisdom: 108 Verses On Changing My Thinking

DAY 60

The universe is merely an illusion.  Of what interest can it be to me?  What reason is there to fear death? 
-Ashtavakra Samhita 3:11
Meditation

The universe is unreal, seeing as it is in constant flux.  For how can something be real if it is one thing one moment and something else the next?  The body, being part and parcel of the ever-changing universe, is also unreal.  Therefore death is but an illusion.  Of what concern is it to me?  I am the unchanging, immortal self.  OM. 

Read Series Introduction

Steady Wisdom: Day 59

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Steady Wisdom: 108 Verses On Changing My Thinking

DAY 59

I am free from impurity.  I am immovable and infinite.  I was not born, not will I decay or die.  I am immortal. 
-Aparokshanubhuti V.28
Meditation

I am infinite, for there is nowhere that existence does not exist.  Because I am infinite, I cannot go anywhere—I am the immovable reality that exists at all places and at all times.  I alone exist so there is nothing external to me that can taint me.  What exists by definition must always exist, can never not exist and can never change.  So I was not born, I do not decay and I do not die.  I am immortal.  OM. 

Read Series Introduction

Steady Wisdom: Day 58

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Steady Wisdom: 108 Verses On Changing My Thinking

DAY 58

I am the non-dual and indestructible self.  Everything is me so there is no reason to feel attached to acquisition. 
-Ashtavakra Samhita 3:1
Meditation

I alone exist.  Since there is only myself, what can I acquire?  I am the one changeless, indestructible reality.  What can I fear to lose?  OM. 

Read Series Introduction

Steady Wisdom: Day 57

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Steady Wisdom: 108 Verses On Changing My Thinking

DAY 57

I am not the body, nor the prana, nor the sense organs, nor the ego, nor the mind, nor the intellect.  I am the eternal consciousness that witnesses them all. 
-Sarva Vedanta Siddhanta Sara Sangraha V.835
Meditation

How can I even speak of the body-mind and its various functions?  It is because they are all known to me, the consciousness that illuminates them.  And just as the sun is never the objects it illuminates nor is it affected by them, I am never the body-mind that I illuminate nor am I affected by it.  OM. 

Read Series Introduction