End Of Knowledge

Tag: shankara

  • Steady Wisdom: Day 64

    Steady Wisdom: 108 Verses On Changing My Thinking

    DAY 64

    The mind’s discriminating cognition, “I am the knower alone, never an object of knowledge, pure, eternally liberated” belongs to the intellect.  It is a transitory object known to me. 
    -Upadesha Sahasri 12:14 (Metrical)
    Meditation

    Self-ignorance, in the form of a thought such as the firm conviction “I am the body-mind” is an object known to me.  Self-knowledge, in the form of a thought such as the firm conviction, “I am the self” is also an object known to me.  Since it is clear that both self-ignorance and self-knowledge are objects known to me, I realize that I wasn’t deluded in the first place.  Nor am I now an enlightened.  I am, and always have been, the eternally liberated self (not that I was ever bound).  OM. 

    Read Series Introduction

  • Steady Wisdom: Week 9 Progress Check

    Steady Wisdom: 108 Verses On Changing My Thinking

    DAY 63 – Week 9 Progress Check

    The steady one who sees the same everywhere, sees no difference between happiness and misery, man and woman, and prosperity and adversity.
    -Ashtavakra Samhita 17:15
    Meditation

    Even though I experience the dualistic, relative and mutually exclusive opposites such as happiness and misery etc., I see (clearly understand) that they are all the same as myself, the non-dual absolute.  OM.

    Read Series Introduction

  • Steady Wisdom: Day 61

    Steady Wisdom: 108 Verses On Changing My Thinking

    DAY 61

    I have no attributes or impurities; I am free of desire and action; I am the eternal, formless and changeless self; I am ever-free. 
    -Atma Bodha V. 35
    Meditation

    I am not the transient, ever changing forms referred to as “this body” and “this mind.”  Therefore I am not defined by their attributes; I am untainted by their impurities; I am unmoved by their desires; I am untouched by their actions.  Just as sand is not moistened by the water of a mirage, I am unaffected by the mirage of the body and mind.  I am ever-free…not that I was ever bound.  OM. 

    Read Series Introduction

  • Steady Wisdom: Day 59

    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

  • What is samsara in Hinduism?

    Q:  What does the term “samsara’ mean in Hinduism? 

    A:  Hinduism is very diverse, with numerous different religious sects and philosophical schools.  So you’re going to get different answers depending on who you ask.  To be clear, I am answering from the perspective of Advaita Vedanta, particularly Advaita Vedanta as taught by Shankara, Swami Dayananda and Dayananda’s students.

    Swami Dayananda defines samsara as “the life of becoming.” In other words, it is 1) Identifying with the body and mind, thinking it is who you are and 2) Subsequently believing that the mortality and suffering of the body and mind belong to you. Further, you believe that the qualities and character of the body and mind define who you are.

    Because of this you are always trying to become something other than what you are.  Perhaps you want to be happier, perhaps you want to become immortal to escape death. Or perhaps you want something more mundane like a slimmer waistline and a more respectable position at work. Either way, feeling like you need to be something other than what you are, that you’re not good enough as you are, or that you’re somehow lacking is a painful cycle: this is samsara.

    This painful cycle of thinking that you’re the body-mind continues (perhaps over lifetimes if the theory of reincarnation is true) until you see directly realize that instead of being the flawed, mortal, ever-changing and limited body-mind, that you’re the immortal, changeless, limitless brahman (the very essence of the entire universe) that is always perfect just as it is.

    But you asked “What is samsara?” not “how do I end it?” so I’m getting ahead of myself.  That’s an answer for another day. 

    All my best – Vishnudeva