Knowledge is power. And the most powerful knowledge is that of the self. With it you learn about the primary enemies of us all, namely attachment (lust, greed), fear and anger.
Identifying the obstacles is not enough, although it can assist in weakening them slightly. More importantly is acting to overcome them and mastering the mind and senses.
Without overcoming these obstacles, one is like a blindfolded person or someone sick with jaundice. Everything appears tinged or blurred. We don't see ourselves and others as we truly are.
By mastering the mind and senses, using the sword or torchlight of knowledge, one can cut the hard knots of attachment and, and dispel the darkness of illusion.
This takes discipline and austerity at first, until one acquires the higher taste. What seems bitter in the beginning turns to sweetness in the end.
After a lifetime of training and practice in mastering the mind and the senses, one may glimpse the truth, the goal. Clarity may appear and calmness prevail as a result.
With a calm mind and pacified senses, one can glimpse one's true nature and tap into the ground of our being, which is - in the end - love.
The result of a lifetime of training is a reawakened love. Not mere love of self and love of life, though that may manifest in some, but rather the ultimate love - for the divine. Love of God includes love of all living entities who are part and parcel of the same one original source, labeled as God.
This higher love is the highest expression of human beings, when they're in their peak topmost state of consciousness. It is a love which is filled with bliss. And it feels endless. This endless love is our final goal and destination. And it's just within reach, if we can just get the mind out of the way.
Bhagavad Gita ch4:10
vīta-rāga-bhaya-krodhā
man-mayā mām upāśritāḥ
bahavo jñāna-tapasā
pūtā mad-bhāvam āgatāḥ
SYNONYMS
vīta—freed from; rāga—attachment; bhaya—fear; krodhāḥ—anger; mat-mayā—fully in Me; mām—unto Me; upāśritāḥ—being fully situated; bahavaḥ—many; jñāna—knowledge; tapasā—by penance; pūtāḥ—being purified; mat-bhāvam—transcendental love for Me; āgatāḥ—attained
TRANSLATION
Being freed from attachment, fear and anger, being fully absorbed in Me and taking refuge in Me, many, many persons in the past became purifled by knowledge of Me—and thus they all attained transcendental love for Me.
PURPORT
As described above, it is very difficult for a person who is too materially affected to understand the personal nature of the Supreme Absolute Truth. Generally, people who are attached to the bodily conception of life are so absorbed in materialism that it is almost impossible for them to understand that there is a transcendental body which is imperishable, full of knowledge and eternally blissful. In the materialistic concept, the body is perishable, full of ignorance and completely miserable. Therefore, people in general keep this same bodily idea in mind when they are informed of the personal form of the Lord. For such materialistic men, the form of the gigantic material manifestation is supreme. Consequently they consider the Supreme to be impersonal. And because they are too materially absorbed, the conception of retaining the personality after liberation from matter frightens them. When they are informed that spiritual life is also individual and personal, they become afraid of becoming persons again, and so they naturally prefer a kind of merging into the impersonal void. Generally, they compare the living entities to the bubbles of the ocean, which merge into the ocean. That is the highest perfection of spiritual existence attainable without individual personality. This is a kind of fearful stage of life, devoid of perfect knowledge of spiritual existence. Furthermore there are many persons who cannot understand spiritual existence at all. Being embarassed by so many theories and by contradictions of various types of philosophical speculation, they become disgusted or angry and foolishly conclude that there is no supreme cause and that everything is ultimately void. Such people are in a diseased condition of life. Some people are too materially attached and therefore do not give attention to spiritual life, some of them want to merge into the supreme spiritual cause, and some of them disbelieve in everything, being angry at all sorts of spiritual speculation out of hopelessness. This last class of men take to the shelter of some kind of intoxication, and their affective hallucinations are sometimes accepted as spiritual vision. One has to get rid of all three stages of attachment to the material world: negligence of spiritual life, fear of a spiritual personal identity, and the conception of void that underlies the frustration of life. To get free from these three stages of the material concept of life, one has to take complete shelter of the Lord, guided by the bona fide spiritual master, and follow the disciplines and regulative principles of devotional life. The last stage of the devotional life is called bhāva, or transcendental love of Godhead.
According to Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu, the science of devotional service:
ādau śraddhā tataḥ sādhu-saṅgo 'tha bhajana-kriyā
tato 'nartha-nivṛttiḥ syāt tato niṣṭhā rucis tataḥ
athāsaktis tato bhāvas tataḥ premābhyudañcati
sādhakānām ayaṁ premṇaḥ prādurbhāve bhavet kramaḥ.
"In the beginning one must have a preliminary desire for self-realization. This will bring one to the stage of trying to associate with persons who are spiritually elevated. In next stage one becomes initiated by an elevated spiritual master, and under his instruction the neophyte devotee begins the process of devotional service. By execution of devotional service under the guidance of the spiritual master, one becomes free from all material attachment, attains steadiness in self-realization, and acquires a taste for hearing about the Absolute Personality of Godhead, Śrī Kṛṣṇa. This taste leads one further forward to attachment for Kṛṣṇa consciousness, which is matured in bhāva, or the preliminary stage of transcendental love of God. Real love for God is called premā, the highest perfectional stage of life." In the premā stage there is constant engagement in the transcendental loving service of the Lord. So, by the slow process of devotional service, under the guidance of the bona fide spiritual master, one can attain the highest stage, being freed from all material attachment, from the fearfulness of one's individual spiritual personality, and from the frustrations resulting from void philosophy. Then one can ultimately attain to the abode of the Supreme Lord.
Reference: Bhagavad Gita As It Is, translation and commentary by Swami A C Bhaktivedanta, original MacMillan 1972 edition, freely available at prabhupadabooks.com.
Image: https://pixabay.com/illustrations/ai-generated-heart-love-fire-9231547/
Edited and published from my mobile device onto the Hive blockchain for those who glimpse the endless love.
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