Chandogya Upanishad

                                    By

                          sri Swami Krishnananda

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  [Image] The philosophy of the Upanishads is that it is an ignorance of
          the way in which the Universe works that binds the individual to
          Samsara—the series of births and deaths.  The affirmation of a
          reality independent of what really is, is called the ego.
  [Image] The greater is the knowledge that we have about anything, the
          greater also is the capacity we have in making it subservient to
          our own selves.  The law of Nature restricts us, because we do
          not have an adequate knowledge of these laws.
  [Image] We cannot understand any aspect of reality which is not in
          space, which is not in time and which is not causally related.
  [Image] The point that the Upanishad would make out is that no event or
          no experience can be isolated from other experiences.
  [Image] The whole universe feels the presence and the birth of a single
          child anywhere.  So what produces a child is not the father or
          the mother. It is the whole cosmos that produces the child.
  [Image] There is no such thing as a private act in this world.
  [Image] Things are not what they seem; there is a deeper significance
          behind every visible process or activity in Nature.
  [Image] There is a total activity, in a subtle form, taking place prior
          to the apparently individual expression of it in the form of
          experience and perception.
  [Image] Everything is interconnected, interlinked in an organic manner,
          so that everything becomes as important as the other.
  [Image] What we like or what we do not like are only the various
          reactions that our personalities produce or evoke in respect of
          impersonal causes of phenomena which have nothing to do with the
          pleasures or the pains of individuals.
  [Image] Thinking is not some isolated activity taking place within our
          heads.  When we think, we do not privately think inside our
          skulls; it is a vibration that we create in us.  The vibration
          of a person is not merely of the physical body—it emanates like
          an aura to a certain distance from the body of the person.
  [Image] If we coordinate ourselves and cooperate with the activity of
          Nature, it becomes a sacrifice, but if we interfere with it and
          adversely affect its normal function, it will also set up a
          reaction of a similar character.  Then, we would be the losers.
  [Image] Our actions in this world are exactly like the offering of
          oblations in a sacrifice for the purpose of invoking a god or
          deity.  We are inviting something, invoking something, calling
          the attention of something for the purpose of experiencing it
          when we perform an action.
  [Image] If we are too greedy, miserly and selfish, everything will be
          withheld from us.  Rainfall, for example, which is the cause of
          the production of food in this world, is not a chance action
          taking place in nature, but the result of mankind fulfilling its
          obligations.
  [Image] There is, in the end, no such thing as a local event in this
          world.  Every event is a universal event as is the case with the
          birth of a human individual.  Every birth is a point of
          universal pressure.
  [Image] Everything is all things, and anything is everywhere.  There is
          no such thing as a particular individual or a particular body.
  [Image] If you very vehemently circulate a torch, you will find that
          there is a circle of fire or light in front of you.  There is no
          circle actually.  It is only an optical illusion created before
          you on account of the intensive velocity of the movement of the
          torch.  So a vibration of consciousness in a particular manner
          becomes cognizable as an object.
  [Image] You know very well that the shape of a walking stick is
          different from a table, but from the point of view of the
          substance, both of them are made of the same wood.  So, the
          knowledge of the walking stick would imply the knowledge of the
          table also, irrespective of their differences structurally.  In
          a similar manner, the rule can be applied to everything in the
          world.  The Upanishad points out to us that all things in the
          world are permutations and combinations of the original
          elements.
  [Image] We mistake these five senses for everything.  There are other
          factors in the object which the senses cannot contact.  Suppose
          we have one thousand senses, we would have seen many other
          things in the world.
  [Image] The highly subtle form and the vibration that is produced by the
          essential quality of the food influences the mind itself.  Your
          capacity of thinking will be very much influenced by the food
          that you take.
  [Image] What happens to all individuals when they reach ultimate Being?
          It can be compared to bees making honey.  Honey includes the
          essences of various flowers, hundreds and hundreds of them that
          have been collected.  The honey is an amalgam of all these
          essences, but in this body of the honey one cannot distinguish
          the essence of one flower from that of another flower.  This is
          what happens to all people when they merge into pure Being.
  [Image] We may say in a sense, the ocean is the self of the rivers
          towards which they go and get absorbed, which they become in the
          end.  So is the case with all individuals that tend towards the
          ocean of the ultimate Being.
  [Image] What we call death is the departing of life from a particular
          body.  So death is not the death of the life principle itself.
          Life itself does not die.  The vitality is transferred from one
          location to another.
  [Image] What is inside the seed of a plant?  It is a great wonder.  You
          may say that you cannot see anything there; it is practically
          invisible and non-existent.  This apparently non-existent
          something, the very little, subtle essence there inside that
          little seed, has become this vast tree in front of you.
  [Image] Though we cannot see a thing, it can exist.  Because the salt is
          dissolved in water, it cannot be seen through the eyes.  But
          through some other means--the organ of taste--we can discover it
          is there.  Similar is the case with the Being that has entered
          into the substance of all this creation.  In the same way as we
          cannot see the salt in water, we cannot see this Being in the
          particulars.  But, by employing other means we can find out that
          this Being is in every particular.
  [Image] We have been exiled from our home and cast into the wilderness
          by these robbers, the senses, and we cannot see things properly
          as they really are.
  [Image] The mind is confounded.  The only way is to ask for help.  Just
          as a person with sight can help a person without sight and can
          point out the way to the destination which he has to reach, so
          is the blindfolded soul in this wilderness of life to take the
          guidance of a person with spiritual eye-sight.
  [Image] There is a difference between death and Self-realisation.  This
          is also the difference between sleep and Self-realisation.  The
          desires of the mind are not destroyed in sleep, or even in
          death.  But the desires of the mind are destroyed in
          Self-realisation, and therefore, there is no return.
  [Image] The cause of the birth of a body in the process of reincarnation
          is the presence of a desire for a particular experience.
  [Image] Death is nothing but the exhaustion of a particular allotted
          portion of Karma and not the entirety of it.
  [Image] For all practical, outward purposes, the liberated man and the
          bound man look alike.  They both speak in the same way, eat in
          the same way, live in the same way.  The distinction is within.
          It is that the liberated one knows what he is, whereas in the
          other case he does not know what he really is.
  [Image] Some spiritual seekers erroneously think that they are God-men
          or that they are about to jump into the ocean of
          God-consciousness.  So, it is necessary to know where we are
          placed.  We should not have any kind of misgivings about where
          we are actually situated.
  [Image] Whatever be the degree of reality in which we are, we should be
          masters of that.
  [Image] One is free to the extent of one’s knowledge.  So, knowledge is
          power.  Wherever there is real knowledge, there is also power to
          the extent of the operation of that knowledge.
  [Image] Complete control of a particular thing is exercised only to the
          extent of the absorption of that particular thing into one’s own
          Self.  Anything that is one with us is controlled by us, and of
          that we are master.  We are not masters of anything that is
          outside us.  So, in the realm of the mind, we should be masters.
  [Image] Mantras are like fire—great forces of directive intelligence.
  [Image] Whoever has attained any kind of greatness in life has achieved
          it only through the power of concentration.  If we start
          thinking of a hundred things, we will achieve nothing.  We
          should apply ourselves to one thing only at a time, apply our
          heart and soul to it and then we shall succeed.
  [Image] One’s power depends proportionately on the depth or extent of
          one’s understanding.
  [Image] Strength is an automatic outcome of a proper functioning and
          coordination of all the limbs of the personality, psychic as
          well as physical.  If one contemplates the capacity that is
          within, then with a proper coordination of these internal
          powers, strength need not be imported from outside.
  [Image] Where one sees nothing except one’s own Self, where one hears
          nothing except one’s own Self, where one understands nothing
          except one’s own Self, that is the Absolute.
  [Image] While the incapacity of probing into the subjectivity of the
          external universe prevents us from knowing everything in the
          universe, there is a possibility of diving into our own Self and
          knowing all things at one stroke.
  [Image] The blessedness of people who know what this Atman is, is grand
          indeed.  Those who depart from this world having realised what
          the Atman is, their jurisdiction is infinite.
  [Image] If the will or the desire of a person is filled with untruth,
          which means to say it has certain characters that cannot be
          corroborated by the nature of truth, to that extent it shall not
          succeed.
  [Image] The more we think we are independent bodily, the more is the
          difficulty for us in this world, because the more is the
          reaction produced by other persons and thing in this world in a
          similar manner.
  [Image] The capacity to fulfil a desire is actually the power of the
          vision to find out where the object of desire is and what
          connection the object has with one’s own self.
  [Image] All those who have died since ages, millions and millions of
          years ago, and all those who have not yet come into being at all
          but are to manifest themselves now or in the ages to come—all
          these forms are capable of being perceived in one’s own heart.
  [Image] When a person rises above body consciousness, there is a
          serenity of experience.  It is as if he is free from a drug
          effect into which he has entered and to which he has been
          subjected for long.  When one attains to this supreme luminosity
          which is one’s own real nature, one is established in one’s
          self.  Then one is in one’s true form.
  [Image] Living in seclusion and other austerities are all great vows, no
          doubt, but whatever one gains by these austerities, vows and
          practices, one gains merely by self-control, because it is the
          highest austerity, and nothing can be comparable to it.
  [Image] Freedom is a chimera as long as there is bodily individuality.
          One has to pass through these ruts of pleasure and pain, these
          transitory experiences of life as long as one is content to be
          in this body.
  [Image] We know very well how much slavery there is in bodily
          individuality.  The conditions of the body, which are the
          outcome of the way in which the physical laws of nature work,
          are limiting us.  Thus, there is no freedom except in a state of
          universality.  There is no freedom as long as there is a body.
          Yet, the consciousness of the existence of the body is not
          necessarily an evil, provided it is experienced in the proper
          perspective.  The mere presence of the body will not be a
          bondage if it is known in its reality.
  [Image] The actions of a Jivanmukta are not individual, but universal
          movements.  He does not think as I think or you think.  His is a
          thought that includes every thought.  He has no awareness of a
          particular encasement in some individual body.
  [Image] The feeling that “I exist” is the Atman speaking in its own
          language.  This feeling is persisting even in dream, and you
          cannot say that it does not exist even in deep sleep.
  [Image] There should be a complete channelisation of our aspiration, in
          the correct direction.  It is for this that we come to the
          masters.  There should be no distraction of aim or purpose.  The
          discipline that is spoken of in the Upanishad is nothing but a
          channelisation of consciousness.
  [Image] We are told that the great Ramatirtha had a peculiar technique
          of his own for self-control.  He used to make a list of all his
          desires.  It was no joke.  It was an honest investigation into
          his own mind.  To some extent we can know what our desires are.
  [Image] The discipline of Brahmacharya, of which the Upanishad speaks,
          is the discipline of dealing with the desires.  What are you
          going to do with your desires?  Are you going to just swallow
          them, or oppose them and crush them, or fulfil them?  A very
          dexterous method has to be employed--neither subjugating, nor
          crushing, nor fulfilling, in the literal sense, but tackling
          them in the manner they should be tackled, under the
          circumstances in which you are placed.
  [Image] The whole of one’s life has to be lived in such a way that it is
          a preparation for the spiritual goal.
  [Image] All of the stages of life are necessary in one’s ascent to the
          spiritual goal.  It is not that the spiritual life commences
          abruptly only after full renunciation, and the earlier three
          stages are disconnected entirely from the spiritual goal.
  [Image] The moment one becomes conscious of the goal of one’s life, then
          it is necessary to see that one’s every activity is somehow or
          other reconciled with this goal.  One should not do any
          incompatible thing against one’s own conscience and against the
          purpose that one has on hand.  Thus it is that it is necessary
          to have one’s entire life transformed into a spiritual art
          through complete dedication.
  [Image] We have to meditate that everything comes from That, everything
          is sustained in That and everything returns to That.  That which
          is the origination, the sustenance and the dissolution of all
          things is this Brahman.
  [Image] All the wishes in your mind, all the desires are the desires of
          the Self ultimately in some way or other.
  [Image] “This Brahman is what I am.”  Thus should we meditate.  The
          moment we get up in the morning, this thought should come to
          mind.  The progress of our life in spirituality can be judged
          from the first thought that occurs to the mind in the early
          morning when we get up.
  [Image] The life of the spirit is not one of suffocation or stifling of
          the mind.  It is a gradual growth of the mind spontaneously,
          like the growth of a baby into an adult without any kind of
          stifling of function.
  [Image] You may be going to a club or to a movie, or you may be having a
          chat with some friends.  All these can be gradually curtailed,
          because they are not essential.  Essentials alone should be
          maintained.
  [Image] There is no such thing as an unspiritual life finally.  The idea
          of “I-ness” and “my-ness” is the cause of this peculiar notion
          in the mind, of there being a distinction between the ordinary
          life and spiritual life.
  [Image] Meditation should be a continued practice.  How long should we
          continue the meditation?  We must continue until we attain
          Self-realisation or until we die, whichever is earlier.
  [Image] If we have intense faith, we will reach our goal.  “I must get
          it; I am doing the best possible thing; I am putting forth all
          my effort to the extent of my possibility; I am doing my
          duty.”   If one has faith of this kind, one should certainly
          attain it.
  [Image] Initiation of a disciple by a Guru is not mere utterance of
          words.  It is a communication of an energy, a force.  It is the
          will of the Guru, as it were, entering into the will of the
          disciple, where both, have to be on the same level.



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