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Thread: What Advaita can offer ...?

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    What Advaita can offer ...?

    Namaste

    For a moment if we assume HDF as miniature world, we find that, we all are in a kind of hot pursuit or in search of something with a belief if it is found will bring peace prosperity wealth satisfaction etc etc.

    So with a basic agreement that we all searching something or the other, what does the knowledge of Advaita offer to the seeker?

    The question might NOT fit into the general norms of Advaita ideologies due to sentence formation. But the idea is to know what Advaita offer to the human who is busy getting the ends to meet?

    Pardon me if similar questions have been raised in the past. I posted as I couldn't find answers ....

    Thanks in advance...
    Anirudh...

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    Re: What Advaita can offer ...?

    Namaste Anirudh,

    As you are aware, Advaita SAdhana is a spiritual path. What do you expect it to deliver to an individual and the world ? If that expectation is known, the answer can be given whether it meets your expectation or not.

    OM
    "Om Namo Bhagvate Vaasudevaye"

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    Re: What Advaita can offer ...?

    Namaste Devotee ji

    Can you explain the meaning of Spritual path? And how it is different from the path a commoner.

    I will explain my objective obehind the question in detail :

    My typical day revolves around executing my family duties and professional duties. Execution of the professional duties helps me to execute my family duties. In this cycle I need a system upon which I can fall back to get motivated something like charging your batteries before you run out of it.

    How does Advaita view my typical day?

    My basic understanding of Advaita says that my body and its typical day are all my illusions due to the wrong identification of my self.

    That is my body will cease (along with my typical day) to exist once the life exits from my body. So my real identification is not my body and its associated typical day but the realization that I exist.

    Because I exist before and after my body, sorrow / happiness that comes along with this body shouldn't affect the realization of my true identity.

    Now assume that I start operating at this level, and if a angry poisonius snake appear in front and the chances of it biting me is 100 percent, what is that Advaita instructs me. I exist before and after the snake bite. I can simply do nothing not even the need to breath or look out for ways to escape. Why should I escape because snake bite is not going alter the status quo ?

    I might sound like a person who has some half baked info on Advaita and arguing based on that. Well my intention is not to criticize or to find fault with Advaita. I am trying to understand its philosophy from the views of a commoner whose typical day is similar to that of mine.


    Quote Originally Posted by devotee View Post
    Namaste Anirudh,

    As you are aware, Advaita SAdhana is a spiritual path.

    OM
    Anirudh...

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    Re: What Advaita can offer ...?

    Namaste Anirudh,

    Quote Originally Posted by Anirudh View Post
    Can you explain the meaning of Spritual path? And how it is different from the path a commoner.
    Spiritual is a word which is made of the root "Spirit" or "essence" meaning the reality that you are. So, it takes you to your reality. I didn't say that other paths (like Bhakti etc.) are not spiritual. I just wanted to say that it is for fulfilling your aim beyond your worldly aims.

    I will explain my objective obehind the question in detail :

    My typical day revolves around executing my family duties and professional duties. Execution of the professional duties helps me to execute my family duties. In this cycle I need a system upon which I can fall back to get motivated something like charging your batteries before you run out of it.

    How does Advaita view my typical day?

    My basic understanding of Advaita says that my body and its typical day are all my illusions due to the wrong identification of my self.
    So, that means that you need to know Advaita SAdhana in a better way.

    See, I am an Engineer by qualification and a manager by profession. I don't face this contradiction. I don't run away from my job or please don't assume that I am anyway less professional in performing my duty. I can't tell you any more about myself due to privacy needed but I can assure you that you can call me reasonably successful in all aspects of a worldly life. However, this doesn't interfere with my being an Advaitin as a spiritual being. In fact, it helps me in performing my tasks with the best of my abilities as I can be calm even in most difficult situations much more easily now than what I was when I was not on this path. And let me assure you that in our school of this path, a large number of my Guru-brothers/sisters are highly educated and very successful in their worldly pursuits in addition to their spiritual advancement.

    So, there is a need to understand this path from a true Guru and making any idea about it by interacting on internet or by reading books will lead to formation of wrong ideas.

    You must do your worldly duty in most efficient way but with a difference. You must keep reminding yourself that you are doing it all because God wanted you to do this. It is God's work you are doing. If you fail, it is God's desire and if you succeed, it is God's wish. You own nothing, you are here only for a temporary period as per God's design. Remember Lord Krishna's words : "MAm anusmara yudhya cha" and "Nityam kuru karmatvam, karma jyayohiakramnah".

    You should do your worldly duty but you must remember always that your most important work here on this earth is to find yourself/God/Self. You must know who you are ... keep striving for Self-realisation.

    That is my body will cease (along with my typical day) to exist once the life exits from my body. So my real identification is not my body and its associated typical day but the realization that I exist.Because I exist before and after my body, sorrow / happiness that comes along with this body shouldn't affect the realization of my true identity.
    Yes.

    Now assume that I start operating at this level, and if a angry poisonius snake appear in front and the chances of it biting me is 100 percent, what is that Advaita instructs me. I exist before and after the snake bite. I can simply do nothing not even the need to breath or look out for ways to escape. Why should I escape because snake bite is not going alter the status quo ?
    You forgot that you are not the body and therefore the snake is also not the body. However, it is ParamArthika satya. You have to act at both the levels simultaneously. You cannot afford to ignore VyAvhArika Satya because your body is an important instrument for attaining your spiritual goal. If you are spirit then Snake is also spirit and there is no biting and there is no death. However, we must perform our duty at VyAvhArika satya level too where my body needs to be saved from snake bite as the body will perish and that will hamper your spiritual goal of Self-realisation and also worldly goal also, if any. So, you have to try to save your body from being destroyed by snake bite. In fact, at lower levels of spirituality (where you cannot guide snake's mind from stop biting), if you have to kill the snake, better kill it and save your body. This is your Dharma as a human being.

    The problem arises when you apply Paramarthika satya in VAyvharika Satya and confuse between the two.

    OM
    "Om Namo Bhagvate Vaasudevaye"

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    Re: What Advaita can offer ...?

    Namaste Devotee ji,

    Thanks for your reply.

    As of now I feel Advaita has got nothing to do with challenges faced in real life. It is like watching a nerve biting thriller movie. As long as you watch the movie you stay addicted but when the projector is switched off, you realize, you can't take decisions to address the day to day challenges with in the gambit of Advaita.

    So your reply has created some more doubts, shall get back to if I cant find their answers by myself.

    What surprises me is how without any modern education our Achaaryas were able to solve many life related problems.

    Thanks again for patiently answering my questions.
    Anirudh...

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    Re: What Advaita can offer ...?

    Namaste
    If a person is used to duality, it is indeed not surprising such doubts stem every now and then. That way you can also ask the same question in reverse mode. How does duality or worshipping forms help in real life? For that matter why should spirituality help at all? If you think we will solve our problems by crying loud in front of a statue then it won’t obviously solve the purpose except for satisfying emotional rants.
    Now I think advaita gives a man the power to decide, decode and decongest the crisis. Now advaita is loving the self in everything which could be your self, the self in a snake or in your neighbour. Second once pure love dawns and your heart chakra opens you will obviously realize the futility and the impunity in even solving material crisis. That is not to say you should go and get bitten by a snake. You can just walk away from there. It needs commonsense and has nothing to do with spirituality. Third from my personal experience once you start seeing equanimity of souls, forget a snake, even a tiger won’t harm you. Humans radiate aura and animals sense that and once an animal feels that you are not a threat, it wont harm you. You need to be non violent in words deeds and actions. Even the worst enemies become friends and the worst karma gets minimised with purity of thought.

    Now you ask for problems in your job. If you do your job as a matter of duty and not for the fruits then you will be happy. And coming to solving crisis, advaita increases IQ(if you want to take it in a literal sense) because it will keep you away from the age old slave mentality that god is a tyrant who wants you in servitude. Atleast advaita wont tell you,you have to chant certain mantras or break so many coconuts or offer fruits or leaves in order to please god. As if God is a business man who wants some cash to return some help.
    And it is a proven fact that TM meditation or for that matter any meditation helps with IQ and once intelligence dawns people can solve crisis. And from personal experience if you sincerely strive with pure desire to attain god then God Himself will help you and if you cant solve a particular crisis then someone else will solve it for you.
    When my sister missed a bug in the software and she was working in a very reputed company and she came home literally in tears as to what would happen the next day when they called her for a meeting. I just asked her to start chanting Hreem Greem Hreem which has both parashakti and her son. The meeting was cancelled the next day and my sister was not even called for a clarification.It is not to state that you should deliberately make mistakes but if you sincerely surrender (not material servitude) to the universal soul He will protect you. If you do some statue worship yet disregard the real god who presides the consciousness of all souls you will only end up fighting with my god is great than yours agenda and end up neither here nor there. And one more thing your spirituality will definitely manifest in the material realm in the form of a worry free progressive environment. Know verily that if your life is full of obstacles and you are not succeeding materially , you are not in the right spiritual path. Once you realize the difference between emotional attachment and spiritual detachment you will understand who god is and how he works

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    Re: What Advaita can offer ...?

    hariḥ oṁ
    ~~~~~~~
    namasté

    Quote Originally Posted by Anirudh View Post
    what does the knowledge of Advaita offer to the seeker?
    I think this is a reasonable question to ask... I am in hopes it is asked in a manner that is not suggesting a transaction is occurring like a purchase or a coin being placed in the slot, and one awaits something to come out of the machine.

    The advaita view ( or for that matter any other noble view) is that which complements one's experience. It is knowledge and experience that benefits the native.
    It is like a match; a match without a strike-plate is a useless piece of wood. Yet when the match hits the strike-plate light and heat is produced. Very useful.

    Knowledge leads to right action which leads to achievement and then to one's fulfillment. Hence knowledge and fulfillment are intertwined.
    If one has limited knowledge then limited fulfillment will be the fruit. So, it is quite practical to have proper knowledge as it offers skill in action.
    Skill in action is the fundamental offering that is found within the bhāgavad gītā and in my opinion within mahābhārata. Kṛṣṇa suggests this in chapter 2 , 48th verse, yogasthaḥ kuru karmānī- established (or steadfast) in yoga ( union) perform actions (karma). This knowledge is ageless and it does not concern itself with any school as it germane to all schools.
    Skill in action brings one into alignment with all the laws of nature as being life supporting and being right actions at the right time.

    Now the question on advaitya - what does it offer ? It suggests how this union is viewed and how sublime this union may blossom into.
    It offers the one in union the blue print of what total reality really is. It informs that person via knowledge what is occurring in his/her experience.
    We even find some of the greatest muni-s asking this question of others. Confirmation of the totality they are experiencing. Hence this advaitya is there for not only this confirmation , but for the milestones that lead one to the door steps of the Supreme that turns out ( within advaitya) to be none other then one's own Self.

    iti śivaṁ
    Last edited by yajvan; 13 October 2014 at 08:32 PM.
    यतस्त्वं शिवसमोऽसि
    yatastvaṁ śivasamo'si
    because you are identical with śiva

    _

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    Re: What Advaita can offer ...?

    Namaste,

    Quote Originally Posted by Anirudh View Post
    As of now I feel Advaita has got nothing to do with challenges faced in real life. It is like watching a nerve biting thriller movie. As long as you watch the movie you stay addicted but when the projector is switched off, you realize, you can't take decisions to address the day to day challenges with in the gambit of Advaita.
    It is just the opposite. You can handle day-to-day challenges in much better way due to strengthening of your mind and with the grace of Guru/God.

    So your reply has created some more doubts, shall get back to if I cant find their answers by myself.
    You are most welcome !

    OM
    Last edited by devotee; 14 October 2014 at 10:57 PM.
    "Om Namo Bhagvate Vaasudevaye"

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    Re: What Advaita can offer ...?

    Namaste Yajvan ji
    On the whole you are saying Advaita or any other philosophies preached by our Achatyas help us to take right decisions at the right time.
    Like for eg, the awareness of the right identity will help us to be free from the materialistic burden that comes along with materialistic life. We can't run away from materialistic life but pro actively protect ourselves from the materialistic burden that comes along.

    How ever, I didn't understand certain portion of your reply. Could you be kind enough to explain those quoted texts especially the yoga part and the union.


    established (or steadfast) in yoga ( union) perform actions (karma).

    It suggests how this union is viewed and how sublime this union may blossom into.
    Anirudh...

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    Re: What Advaita can offer ...?

    Namaste Devotee ji

    Although I am tempted, will learn a bit more to raise related clarifications.

    Right now I am stuck at this point.

    If Self Realization is all about experiencing the truth that there is no difference between my real identity and Bhagwaan, then why do I need God to experience the God in me.

    I can simply replace my friend Shree Raama Chandra Prabhu with my selfie and do a mangala aarathi. I might sound arrogant but this is legally correct with in the framework of Advaita. Isn't it?

    It reminds my younger days as an aethist.
    Anirudh...

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