Something inspiring to me...

[SvgGrdnBeauty]

"...The purpose of this life is to find your Self. Know your Self. Feel the throb of the ocean of God's presence in your heart. Suppose you are floating in the ocean, rocked on the bosom of its might vastness, and when you swim ashore , you still feel the whole ocean surging behind you as you walk onto the beach==this is the way I feel for God. He never leavs any of his children for a moment. He will reply to all your questions, and then there will be no more fears. Find that Power, feel the ocean of His love behind your consciousness, and you will achieve the greatest success man can attain."- "Man's Eternal Quest", Man's Eternal Quest, Paramahansa Yogananda

You don't have to agree or anything like that...but it moved me enough to post it...even if you don't understand why...

[Bhaskar]

Thank you, Nicole, that was indeed a beautiful post. Sri Yoganandji's writing is beautiful and filled with joy and inspiration.

Have you read his book The Second Coming of Christ?

Its really brilliant, explaining the bible in terms of advaita and finding the true jewels of beauty hidden inside them.

[SvgGrdnBeauty]

Have you read his book The Second Coming of Christ?

Its really brilliant, explaining the bible in terms of advaita and finding the true jewels of beauty hidden inside them.
No, I haven't read that one yet... I read some of the excerpts from it on the SRF website...I would like to eventually read it, but they don't carry it at our local Barnes and Nobles... I have read the Autobiography of a Yogi, Rubiyat Explain, The Divine Romance, Where There Is Light, and I just finished Man's Eternal Quest. If I can find a copy of The Second Coming of Christ I would like to read it...or I'm going to get the third book of lectures and essays (the one that comes after The Divine Romance)...

[Bhaskar]

I strongly reccomend you read the works of Swami Rama Tirtha. He was another truly wonderful orator and writer and his words are a fountain of joy.

[SvgGrdnBeauty]

I strongly reccomend you read the works of Swami Rama Tirtha. He was another truly wonderful orator and writer and his words are a fountain of joy.
I've never heard of him...I'll look into it...thanks. :)

[Bhaskar]

http://www.ramatirtha.org/freebooks.htm
You're in luck, I found free online versions of Rama Tirthaji's books, In the Woods of God-Realization.

What the world said of Sri Rama Tirtha:


Swami Vivekanand

"..... Tirtha Rama (the previous name of Swami Rama Tirtha), you are to become a Torch-bearer of ‘Advait Vedanta’ (Non-Dualism) ....."

Mahatma Gandhi
(Father of Indian Nation)

"..... Swami Rama Tirtha was one of the greatest souls, not only of India, but of the whole world ....."

Ramana Maharshi
"..... Swami Rama Tirtha represents True Atman ....."


Swami Shivananda
(Founder of Divine Life Society)
"..... Swami Rama Tirtha lived Practical Vedanta ..... He is Soul Incarnate ....."


Guru Charan Singh
(ex-Head, Radha Swami Satsang)

"..... Swami Rama Tirtha’s utterances were joyous cry of happy heart, completely confident of his own experiences ....."


Swami Chinmayananda
(Founder, Chinmay Mission)
"..... Swami Rama Tirtha has imprints, all-embracing and all-pervading. To understand him is to live Vedanta ....."


Mohammad Iqbal
( A poet and a scholar )
"..... Rama is all sense and consciousness ....."

[Though Swami Rama Tirtha stayed in Japan hardly for a fortnight, his presence and oration was widely appreciated. Those who came in his contact in this short duration cherished his memory for a long time.]

"..... At the Buddhist University, Tokyo, Swami Rama Tirtha spoke shedding sparks of fire. In the audience were also Buddhists and Theosophists from Australia who listened to him with rapt attention and with him on the same platform spoke Mr. Kanzo Uchimura, the Carlyle of Japan ....."

Professor Takakutsu of the Tokyo Imperial University says: "I have met many Pandits and Philosophers at the house of Professor Max Muller in England and other places, but I have never seen a personality like Swami Rama. In him Vedanta and Buddhism meet. He is true religion. He is a true poet and philosopher."

It was in 1902 that a ship sailing from Japan reached its destination, the port of San Francisco on whose deck was walking a Sanyasin—Swami Rama—in Divine Joy. Attracted by the glow of Rama, an American gentleman approached him as to know about his destination and his belongings etc. A mere touch of the shoulders of the American—Dr. Hillar—by ‘Rama’, travelling without a penny, baggage and acquaintance in America, satisfied all his queries and Dr. Hillar became an ardent admirer of Rama. Thus stepped Rama on the land of U.S.A.

"..... This remarkable sage of the Himalayas is a slender, intellectual young man, with ascetic mould of a priest ....." How do I live? To answer this question he said yesterday, ‘This is simple. I do not try. I believe. I attune my soul to the harmony of love for all man, that makes all men to love me and where love is, there is no want, no suffering ....."


"..... The President of the United States on his way to the north stopped at Springs (Shastra) awhile ..... he accepted from Rama most gracefully, lovingly and cheerfully the "Appeal on behalf of India ....." (May 20, 1903)

On his way back to India in 1904, Swami Rama Tirtha got a chance to step on the land of Egypt as the ship carrying him stopped there for a while. The people there were impressed by him and requested Rama to address the gathering from the pulpit of the famous mosque at Cairo. Not only the people who heard him in their own language, but the Press also spoke high of Rama. The paper—‘Alabhat’ says:

"..... Swami Rama Tirtha was given a warm welcome by the people here when he delivered a lecture in Persian in the Mosque. Swami Rama is a great Hindu genius, to meet whom was a great privilege ....."

[philuk]

great find Bhaskar
I like this part,

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
There are hundreds of stories illustrating this subjects in the Hindu scriptures. There is an Indian story about the prime minister of a king, who underwent all the ascetic practices which are necessary to see the goddess of fortune in flesh and blood before him. Well, he practised all those mantrum, incantations and charms. A million times he repeated sacred mantrum that were calculated to make him realize the presence of goddess Lakshmi. She did not appear. Three million times he underwent all the ascetic practices, still the Goddess was not visible.

He lost all faith in these things and renounced everything in the world, took up sannyasa and became a monk. The very moment that he embraced sannyasa (monk-life) and left the palace and retired into the forests, he found the goddess before him. He cried, "Go away, goddess, why are you here now? I want you no more. I am a monk. What has monk to do with luxury, with riches, with wealth and worldly enjoyments? When I wanted you, you came not; now that I do not desire you, you come before me". The goddess replied, "You yourself stood in the way. So long you were desiring, you were asserting duality, you were making a beggar of yourself and that kind of being can have nothing." The moment you rise above desires and spurn them, you are God, and to God belongs the glory. That is the secret.

[Bhaskar]

Swami Rama is such a great inspiration. Here is my favourite part, from the essay The Sun of Self on the Wall of the Mind.

On second thought, the essay in its entirety is my favourite.

http://ramatirtha.org/vol1/sunself.htm

[Kharakov]

The goddess replied, "You yourself stood in the way. So long you were desiring, you were asserting duality, you were making a beggar of yourself and that kind of being can have nothing." The moment you rise above desires and spurn them, you are God, and to God belongs the glory. That is the secret.As long as you are holding your position of being in desire, you are not yet in the position of having fulfillment of your desire. Letting go of your desires is one thing, it is another to have them fulfilled. God does not want you to think (mistakenly) that it is your own will and effort that has brought you these things- it is a gift from God.

Your desire and attempts to achieve that desire being thwarted are gifts from your God. When you finally stop attempting to gain what you desire on your own and patiently await God to bring these things to you (or give up trying to get them) God can bring them to you because you will no longer think that it is because of your own will that you have gained these things. God does this so that you can see God's will in your gaining of these blessings instead of your own- you cannot rape or pillage God, God will only give to you what you need to see that God is blessing you of God's own free will and desire- that by no power of your own are these blessings granted.

Of course, within the world we live, we have many oppurtunities to exercise our will- but these oppurtunities must be seen as coming from God before God can give us greater oppurtunities or we will (mistakenly) think that these oppurtunities have arose because of our own efforts.

[philuk]

yes thats a wonderful passage Bhaskar, thanks for pointing it out

-------------------------------------

There in your dreams, you become the seer on one side and the object seen on the other side. If you see a horse and the rider in a dream, both make their appearance together; if you see a mountain in the dream, the mountain is the object and you, the seer or observer. There the object and the subject make their appearances together. There by a kind of time, the past and future of the dream is also simultaneous with the object; the past, present and future of the dream, the causation of the dream and the subject and object of the dream, all these make their appearance simultaneously.
Similarly Vedanta says, in your wakeful state also you are the object seen and you are the seeing subject; you are the friends and foes on that side and you are their observer on this side; you are the enemies on one side and you are the friends on the other side; you are everything. But all these apparent phenomena of the dream, phenomena of the deep sleep state, phenomena of the wakeful state, all these phenomena are mutable, changeable fickle, uncertain, indefinite. The real Self which was compared to the Sun, the real Atman, shines upon the three bodies in the same way that the Sun shines upon the three bodies of the river, that Atman is immutable, unchangeable.

[BlackBillBlake]

As long as you are holding your position of being in desire, you are not yet in the position of having fulfillment of your desire. Letting go of your desires is one thing, it is another to have them fulfilled. God does not want you to think (mistakenly) that it is your own will and effort that has brought you these things- it is a gift from God.

Your desire and attempts to achieve that desire being thwarted are gifts from your God. When you finally stop attempting to gain what you desire on your own and patiently await God to bring these things to you (or give up trying to get them) God can bring them to you because you will no longer think that it is because of your own will that you have gained these things. God does this so that you can see God's will in your gaining of these blessings instead of your own- you cannot rape or pillage God, God will only give to you what you need to see that God is blessing you of God's own free will and desire- that by no power of your own are these blessings granted.

Of course, within the world we live, we have many oppurtunities to exercise our will- but these oppurtunities must be seen as coming from God before God can give us greater oppurtunities or we will (mistakenly) think that these oppurtunities have arose because of our own efforts.
A Vedantist might reply that these desires are nothing but illusions. If identity with the supreme can be realized, then there can be no question of desire, because the Supreme already posesses everything fully and completely.

Even from the standpoint of the dualist, the usual advice is to offer these desires to the Divine, to seek to transcend them, and develop the one single desire for God.

[SvgGrdnBeauty]

Thank you all for sharing...! All your posts are very interesting. :)

[Kharakov]

Even from the standpoint of the dualist, the usual advice is to offer these desires to the Divine, to seek to transcend them, and develop the one single desire for God.
I dunno, I just think God is pretty cool and fun to hang with so I don't really wanna be God because then I wouldn't be hanging out with God. Silly I guess. I like the companionship.

[Bhaskar]

A Vedantist might reply that these desires are nothing but illusions. If identity with the supreme can be realized, then there can be no question of desire, because the Supreme already posesses everything fully and completely.


A vedantin wouldnt say the supreme possesses everything, since posession implies duality, a possesor and a possessed. A veadntin would identify fully with all things as being one, therefore the question desire doesnt arise at all, since there remains nothing to desire. It is as absurd as desiring my own arms.

[BlackBillBlake]

A vedantin wouldnt say the supreme possesses everything, since posession implies duality, a possesor and a possessed. A veadntin would identify fully with all things as being one, therefore the question desire doesnt arise at all, since there remains nothing to desire. It is as absurd as desiring my own arms.
Well thanks for your correction Bhaskar. But in the end, it's all just words.

[Bhaskar]

absolutely.

[SurfhipE]

"...The purpose of this life is to find your Self. Know your Self. Feel the throb of the ocean of God's presence in your heart. Suppose you are floating in the ocean, rocked on the bosom of its might vastness, and when you swim ashore , you still feel the whole ocean surging behind you as you walk onto the beach==this is the way I feel for God. He never leavs any of his children for a moment. He will reply to all your questions, and then there will be no more fears. Find that Power, feel the ocean of His love behind your consciousness, and you will achieve the greatest success man can attain."- "Man's Eternal Quest", Man's Eternal Quest, Paramahansa Yogananda

You don't have to agree or anything like that...but it moved me enough to post it...even if you don't understand why...

That was definitely inspiring and beauitful, thank you. What is this from..a book?

[philuk]

i assume its from Man's Eternal Quest by Paramahansa Yogananda

http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art14259.asp

[SvgGrdnBeauty]

i assume its from Man's Eternal Quest by Paramahansa Yogananda

http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art14259.asp
yes...that is the book. :)