Kathopanishad : ( 04/03/2013. )

========================================================================== Sunday, January 01, 2023. 07:00 Discourse - 4.1. Post -20. ======================================================================== The grand destination, this wondrous structure of the Universe, the goal of life is not easy of approach. The Upanishad cautions us: --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- uttiṣṭhata jāgrata; prāpya varān nibodhata. Do not be under the notion that you can get this blissful experience in a trice. Awake! Arise! Stop not till the goal is reached! Seek refuge with men of wisdom. Know it, then, by surrender to them. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- kṣurasya dhārā niśitā duratyayā; durgam pathas tat kavayo vadanti. Subtle is this path, difficult is this way, hard it is to enter the citadel of this mysterious yoga. I

 ========================================================================= ========================================================================= Wednesday, December 14, 2022. 07:00. Discourse - 3.8  Post -19. ========================================================================= Avyakta is that inscrutable, indescribable precondition of the manifestation of all things, we call prakriti, maya, avyakrita, and so on, though all these terms do not convey a true meaning of what it is. The presupposition, the pre-condition, the necessity, the cause behind the expression of this Universe in its visible form is avyakta. Every effect must have a cause. If the Universe is to be regarded as an effect, logically speaking, there must be a cause thereof. This is the Seed of all things. And beyond this final Cause, is the Causeless Cause, the unmoved Mover, the Purusha. Beyond the Avyakta is the Purusha. The Purusha is Supreme. What is this Purusha? Purusha is a term we apply to what truly Is,

 ========================================================================= CHINMAYA INTERNATIONAL FOUNDATION- (CIF) Hari Om. It is always a joy to share the achievements of all who connect with CIF through our Home Study Courses.  Twenty two students from the Chinmaya Sagar zone, Mumbai, completed CIF’s Advanced Vedanta Course facilitated by Sevak Smt. Jasmine Asher, under the guidance of Swami Swatmananda (Chinmaya Shivam).  On 30th October, Swami Swatmanandaji graced the graduation ceremony and handed out the Course Completion Certificates to the students.  Chinmaya International Foundation congratulates the 22 Sadhakas and Smt. Jasmine Asher! ========================================================================= Friday, November 25, 2022. 07:00. Discourse -3.7  Post -18. ========================================================================= Here we come to a halt, as it were, because of exhaustion of all our available resources. Beyond the intellect you know nothing. The intel

 ======================================================================== ======================================================================== Monday, November 07, 2022. 07:00. Discourse -3.  Post -17. ========================================================================= Having guarded ourselves adequately with a knowledge of the difficulty of acquiring this mystery of mysteries in our experience, we try to understand what the Lord Yama, the great teacher of the Katha Upanishad, must have spoken as the final word to Nachiketas. Even when Yama comes to the main point in question, he does not hit it directly. He tries to approach it gradually. This is the technique of the teaching of any science or art. When you speak on any subject or teach a particular branch of learning, you should not forthwith go to the subject at the very beginning itself. That would be difficult for the student to comprehend. You must follow what they call the Socratic method of teaching.  You speak as if

 ======================================================================= ======================================================================= Wednesday, October 05, 2022. 06:00. Discourse -3.  Post -16. ========================================================================= Now, what is knowledge? Why is it regarded as so subtle? The subtlety of it really lies in the fact that it is not an object of knowledge. Anything that is an object of our understanding or mind can be regarded as a gross presentation definable in character—spatial and temporal in its location, and causal in its connection. The whole world is a network of space, time and cause. Everything is somewhere in space. Everything is sometime in the passage of the temporal process of events, and everything is connected with something else in a causal chain. Everything is a cause, and everything is an effect. This is the way we try to understand things. But this supreme mystery about which Nachiketas put the third questi

 ======================================================================== ========================================================================= Monday, September 19,2022. 06:00. Discourse -3.  Post -15. ======================================================================== Now, the Guru should have a double qualification. He must be living what he teaches, and also he should have the power to express what he knows. That is a brahmanishtha and a shrotriya, beautifully blended. Such a person is an ananya. You have no other alternative than this. You approach a Guru who is established in the knowledge which he has acquired, in whom knowledge has become a part of his being and life and practice, and who has also the blessing of the power of expression; otherwise, this truth cannot be known. This knowledge cannot be obtained through mere study for oneself, by private enterprise, merely. It requires the grace of a Master. Knowledge acquired through a Guru is living knowledge.  It has a