viveka

OM
Blessed Self:
This is the summary of what we have talked a lot about today. Everyday of this vedanta course has brought us to a very deep level of realization and communication. There are things I never spoke about in other context, that I was able to bring out in this context. The students were receptive and thinking deeply, many things have been revealed about their own path, their wrong thinking and their obstacles.

We talked a lot about the necessity for aspirants to think properly about one's life and directions by questionning oneself (vichara) about what is atma (self) and non atma (not self). This is termed viveka - discrimination between the real and unreal.
To be able to recognize what is atma and non atma implied that we are already the atma.
That recognition or knowledge is not an inttelectual recognition or knowledge but a state of being.
Viveka is there with aspirants but it is not unbroken and it is faulty. Faulty and imperfect thinking about onself makes one makes mistake over and over again, taking the non atman for the atman, thus getting lost in illusions.
The truth will set one free, and the untruth can't be true, no matter what one would like to think about it.

The ego is the problem as it doesn't surrender to knowledge.
Self Surrender means renunciation of ego. One has to have something in order to surrender. One can not surrender something or renounce something that one doesn't have. That means that renunciation has to come with discrimination. This means that one has to have the firm conviction that what one renounces is for higher truth, a higher gain and one is not loosing something by renouncing. One has to know that one is free to do what one chooses, but it is better to follow that path that leads one higher. That decision has to be made out of strength and conviction but not out of fears or to please someone. In other words, you have to make your own decision about renouncing the ego for a higher realization. Not because you are running away from something. So if you are not keeping the renunciation, it is because the viveka or discrimination is broken. We forgot why we renounced at the first place, and we took back what we have renounced.

When the desire is there for external thing, and when the ego is still very unyielding, the relationship with Guru (teacher)wanes, and one thinks that one knows and are in control.
One forgets to self surrender or to surrender the ego. At that time one takes back what one has renounced, and gets back what one has known to be an imperfect strategy for growth. One forgets that this familiar strategy that one has devised for one's life didn't work and can not work. This egoistic pattern of action Can Not give what we really want, the immortality, the Atman, our own Self.

Relationship with Guru exists only as far as one is wanting to honor this self search, in otherwords as far as the desire for liberation is there. Relationship with Guru disappears the moment the desire for liberation is not there. At that time what one sees as one's Guru might appear only as a person, a friend, or merely an imperfect body.

The desire for liberation is not there when one doesn't perfect one self in the qualifications : viveka, vairagya, and shat sampat.

1. knowing what one is and what one is not
2. staying detached from one's desires for involvement in the unreal (out of forces of habits)
3. practicing contentment and tranquility knowing that the inner life is the only road to freedom.
4. practicing control of senses and turning inward, knowing that there is nothing really worth it outside.
5. bearing through the difficulties of spiritual life, and keep going - not giving up, nor drop off the high thinking.
6. and know with faith that it is leading one to a better life, that the truth exists, that one is on the right path, that the teacher is leading you to the right place. Also have faith that one can do it.
7. keep this practice of dwelling within and detachment to other things presented in our minds, in a constant manner so one doesn't get lost again and stay balanced in all situations.

Therefore one has to perfect oneself in those qualifications to be able to keep maintaining the connection with our own Atman - through the agency of seeing the Guru. If not you loose the perspective of all that is truly about and see only the limited , emotional or personal or physical nature of the Guru.

The relationship works both way. The Guru will not tell the students what to do. It has to be the students that by his own free will, and out of discrimination, that come to the teacher ansd ask for help. Doing service to Guru is a way to tune oneself to the Guru's wavelength, thus matching the ego with the Guru and self surrendering oneself through the process of selfless action or selfless service. It combines the Bhakti Yoga, Karma Yoga, the Raja Yoga and the Jnana Yoga - discrimination, dispassion, shat sampat etc... together.

The Guru doesn't need the students, it is the student that needs the Guru. The Guru out of selfless love or compassion shares the knowledge and help the struggling students. He can not help the students against himself as the students need to realize that he/she needs help. Because no one can really eat for you if you are the one that is hungry. The teacher has to wait till the student is ready to give him knowledge. The student has to perfect his discrimination and his dispassion as well as his self control in order to receive the next help from teacher.

Om swami sita