Life Worth Living?
Just a few days ago one of my friends wrote to me about the death of his mentor-Lalit Sheth.
He asked me why such type of things happen to people and if I can make any sense in it!
Shankara says to us in the beautiful treatise Vivekachudamani in the opening lines as much on the importance of this human life.
The most difficult thing for us is to get a human birth and that is the foremost thing in the goody bag.
Now that you are reading this, thank the great God for giving you this human birth.
Just imagine if you were born a stone, how many lives would it take for you to become human?
A billion or Zillion? So thank your stars for getting up here to read this stuff.
Next in hierarchy is the strength of body and the will to run it.
If you were born with bodily or mental defects, then the progression is extremely tough.
Now have you noticed the sages have complete indifference towards anyone who has physical or mental disability? That is because they know the law of karma has done the job there. It states what you sow is what you reap so if you have maimed someone in your previous karmic life, you have got this disability as a return gift! Does that person need sympathy? You tell me do you sympathize with a person who has raped a minor? No! But the same person has gone through that in some previous life through the hands of the current victim. God's law is clear here. All the credits and debits have to be nullified here in some birth of yours!
The third most important thing and still more difficult then the previous one is purity in your life. Now our great elders always consider drinking, gambling, womanising and the like as wrong doing but is that what purity is all about? Take the case of the Pandavas or Ravana....they did all the above and yet got liberated so it is not about these things but purity is all about non tainting of the mind in any which way. Even a thought about some small misdemeanor is tainting. Got that?
The next harder is the desire to live a spiritual life. Now we all live for our families, wife, parents, children, job, money, properties, state, for others welfare and so on but do we bother even an iota to live for knowing our own Self? This Self is not the lower self but that which is called God or Brahman or Jehovah? Do we aspire for liberation?
The next hardest is knowing and understanding the true knowledge of the scriptures.
Please know that the scriptures are not stories or some strange religious rites and ceremonies but they contain true knowledge of the Self. The ignorant a person, the more it seems like a fairy tale. The more spiritually advanced the person, the more spiritual the understanding. Just know that you cannot explain where the babies come from to a small child so we make up stories of the coming of the stork and so on. Ignorance does not allow us to know the true nature of epics like Ramayana, Mahabharata or the Vedas.
You have to take a million lives to actually come to the true understanding of the above ken.
It is said only by God's grace can you get this advantage of a human birth, then the urge to know about the truth about God or quest for liberation and lastly the coming of the Guru in your life.
Now coming back to why Lalit Sheth died? He lived this human life by virtue of his own karma. It is a great thing to be born human, first and foremost. Now the next did he qualify for the rest only he will know.
Now that I have written the above blog, you decide the whys and the wherefores of your own coming here and if you still have that yearning for liberation.
The answer to why he died does not exist anywhere. But the answer to did he get liberated exists.
Karma makes the world go round and to be trapped in continuous birth and death cycle is a choice you have. Do you want liberation? Then forget all others and just focus on your own quest for liberation. Now is the time for that.
He asked me why such type of things happen to people and if I can make any sense in it!
Shankara says to us in the beautiful treatise Vivekachudamani in the opening lines as much on the importance of this human life.
The most difficult thing for us is to get a human birth and that is the foremost thing in the goody bag.
Now that you are reading this, thank the great God for giving you this human birth.
Just imagine if you were born a stone, how many lives would it take for you to become human?
A billion or Zillion? So thank your stars for getting up here to read this stuff.
Next in hierarchy is the strength of body and the will to run it.
If you were born with bodily or mental defects, then the progression is extremely tough.
Now have you noticed the sages have complete indifference towards anyone who has physical or mental disability? That is because they know the law of karma has done the job there. It states what you sow is what you reap so if you have maimed someone in your previous karmic life, you have got this disability as a return gift! Does that person need sympathy? You tell me do you sympathize with a person who has raped a minor? No! But the same person has gone through that in some previous life through the hands of the current victim. God's law is clear here. All the credits and debits have to be nullified here in some birth of yours!
The third most important thing and still more difficult then the previous one is purity in your life. Now our great elders always consider drinking, gambling, womanising and the like as wrong doing but is that what purity is all about? Take the case of the Pandavas or Ravana....they did all the above and yet got liberated so it is not about these things but purity is all about non tainting of the mind in any which way. Even a thought about some small misdemeanor is tainting. Got that?
The next harder is the desire to live a spiritual life. Now we all live for our families, wife, parents, children, job, money, properties, state, for others welfare and so on but do we bother even an iota to live for knowing our own Self? This Self is not the lower self but that which is called God or Brahman or Jehovah? Do we aspire for liberation?
The next hardest is knowing and understanding the true knowledge of the scriptures.
Please know that the scriptures are not stories or some strange religious rites and ceremonies but they contain true knowledge of the Self. The ignorant a person, the more it seems like a fairy tale. The more spiritually advanced the person, the more spiritual the understanding. Just know that you cannot explain where the babies come from to a small child so we make up stories of the coming of the stork and so on. Ignorance does not allow us to know the true nature of epics like Ramayana, Mahabharata or the Vedas.
You have to take a million lives to actually come to the true understanding of the above ken.
It is said only by God's grace can you get this advantage of a human birth, then the urge to know about the truth about God or quest for liberation and lastly the coming of the Guru in your life.
Now coming back to why Lalit Sheth died? He lived this human life by virtue of his own karma. It is a great thing to be born human, first and foremost. Now the next did he qualify for the rest only he will know.
Now that I have written the above blog, you decide the whys and the wherefores of your own coming here and if you still have that yearning for liberation.
The answer to why he died does not exist anywhere. But the answer to did he get liberated exists.
Karma makes the world go round and to be trapped in continuous birth and death cycle is a choice you have. Do you want liberation? Then forget all others and just focus on your own quest for liberation. Now is the time for that.
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