Culmination Of Life – In Gita Verse 9.20 Those who study the Vedas and drink the soma juice, seeking the heavenly planets, worship Me indirectly. Purified by sinful reactions, they take birth on the pious, heavenly planet of Indra, where they enjoy godly delights.
Krishna is saying that person who can live in the world but always in remembrance of Death, those only can enjoy godly delights.
In my Bhagavad Gita Verse 7.29, blog I wrote A great sage sent his chief disciple to the court of King Janak to learn something which was missing in the young man.
Death is not the end of life, it is the culmination of life. It is one of the most beautiful experiences. If you have really loved then only will you experience the beauty of death; if you miss life itself in listening to the sermons in the churches, in reading the Bible, and all kinds of nonsense … if you have missed life itself you will die in a coma. Before death comes you will become unconscious, so you will miss the experience of death. The people who are living consciously – and that is basic, live consciously every moment. Even while making love, remain conscious and a witness. It is a life… long growth if becoming alert. Then you can die consciously and you can experience death as the ultimate orgasm. It is far bigger than any sexual orgasm. In fact, the difference is not only in quantity, but the difference is in quality. It is immeasurable. Living moment to moment, one learns how to die. beautifully, silently, joyously.
One is going on another adventure. Unknown – Krishna doesn’t give any ideas what is going to happen after death, because that is absolutely wrong, destroying. It is like if I loved the movie and I tell you the whole story of the movie, and then tell you that I have bought a ticket for you, go and see. I have destroyed it already; what is the point of seeing it? I give them the ticket, but I don’t tell them what is going to happen. That they have to discover on their own. It is tremendously beautiful because I have lived before and I have died before, and I have died consciously so I know what a beauty it is. It is not the end; it is always a new beginning.
Death is the crescendo, the highest peak that life can attain. In the moment of death much is possible. If you have been preparing and preparing, meditating and waiting, then at the moment of death enlightenment is very easily possible – because death and enlightenment are similar. A master, one who is enlightened, can easily make you enlightened at the moment of death. Even before, whenever it happens, you have to be ready to die.
What happens in death? Suddenly you are losing your body; suddenly you are losing your mind. Suddenly you feel you are going away from yourself – all that you believe to be yourself. It is painful, because you feel you are going to be drowned into emptiness. You will be nowhere now, because you were always identified with the body and the mind, and you never knew the beyond; you never knew yourself beyond the body and the mind. You got fixed and obsessed with the periphery that the centre was completely forgotten.
In death you have to encounter this fact: that the body is going, now it cannot be retained any more. The mind is leaving you – now you are no more in control of the mind. The ego is dissolving – you cannot even say ‘I’. You tremble with fear, on the verge of nothingness. You will be no more. But if you have been preparing, if you have been meditating – and preparation means if you have been making all efforts to use death, to use this abyss of nothingness – rather than being pulled into it you have been getting ready to jump into it, it makes a lot of difference.
If you are being pulled into it, grudgingly – you don’t want to go into it and you have been snatched – then it is painful. Much anguish! And the anguish is so intense that you will become unconscious in the moment of death. Then you miss.
But if you are ready to jump there is no anguish. If you accept and welcome it, and there is no complaint – rather, you are happy and celebrating that the moment has come, and now I can jump out of this body which is a limitation, can jump out of this body which is a confinement, can jump out of this ego which has always been a suffering – if you can welcome, then there is no need to become unconscious.
If you can become accepting, welcoming – what Buddhists call tathata, to accept it, and not only to accept, because the word accept is not very good, deep down some non-acceptance is hidden in it – no, if you welcome, if it is such a celebration, an ecstasy, if it is a benediction, then you need not become unconscious.
If it is a benediction, you will become perfectly conscious in that moment. Remember these two things: if you reject, if you say no, you will become totally unconscious; if you accept, welcome, and say yes with your full heart, you will become perfectly conscious. Yes to death makes you perfectly conscious; no to death makes you perfectly unconscious – and these are the two ways of dying. A Buddha dies totally accepting. There is no resistance, no fight between him and death. Death is divine; you die fighting.
If a man has been preparing, getting ready, at the moment of death the master can be miraculously helpful. Just a word at the right moment and the flame inside suddenly explodes, you become enlightened – because the moment is such; so intense, you are so concentrated at one point.
Krishna says – Those who study the Vedas and drink the soma juice, seeking the heavenly planets, worship Me indirectly – they understand that death is not the opposite of life but part of it, an intrinsic part of it, which can never be separated from it – once you accept death as a friend, suddenly a transformation happens. You are transfigured, your vision now has a new quality in it. Now there is no fight, no war, you are not fighting against anybody, now you can relax, now you can be at home. Once death becomes a friend only then does life become a friend also. This may look paradoxical but it is so, only the appearance is paradoxical. If death is the enemy, then deep down life is also the enemy, because life leads to death.
Tags: Culmination Of Life
