Begin With Yourself – In Gita Verse 10.14 O Kṛṣṇa, I totally accept as truth all that You have told me. Neither the demigods nor the demons, O Lord, can understand Your personality.
On behalf of all of us Arjuna says to Krishna that we have knowledge of truth that You have told without knowing the truth.
In my Bhagavad Gita Verse 10.12-13, blog I wrote – This whole tragedy, this dilemma of the human mind, is that the mind is closed, the mind is closing, and this mind goes on searching for that which will be freedom.
To know the Truth – Do not begin with God. That is a false beginning. It always leads to nonsense. So all metaphysics is nonsense. It goes on thinking about things about which nothing can be thought. It goes on giving statements about the existence about which no statements can be given. Only silence can be a statement about it. But if you begin with yourself, then much that is solid can be said. If you begin with yourself, then something scientific can be done. If you begin with yourself, then you begin with the right beginning.
Religion means to begin with oneself, and metaphysics means to begin with God. So metaphysics is madness – of course, with a method. All madmen are metaphysicians without method and all metaphysicians are mad but with methodology. Because of their methodology they seem to be talking sense, and they go on talking nonsense.
Begin with yourself. Do not ask whether God exists. Ask whether “I” exists. Do not ask whether love is an attribute of the divine. Ask whether love is an attribute of mine, whether I have ever loved. Do not ask about grace. Ask whether I have ever felt gratitude, because that is the pole which is just nearby, which is just a step from us. We can know it.
Always begin from the beginning. Never begin from the end because then it is no beginning at all. One who begins from the beginning always reaches the end and one who begins from the end does not even reach the beginning, because to begin from the end is impossible. You can just go on and on.
Make God not a metaphysical notion but a religious experience. Go inward. He is there always waiting for you. But then you have to do something with yourself. That doing is meditation; that doing is yoga. Do something with yourself. As you are, you are closed. As you are, you are dead. As you are, you are not in any dialogue. You cannot be in any dialogue with the divine, with existence. So transform yourself. Open some doors, break open some spaces, make some windows, jump outside of your mind, your past. And then it is not only that you will know, but you will live. You will live with the grace of the divine, you will live with the love; you will be part of it, just a ripple of it. And once you have become a ripple of it, a wave of the divine, only then is there authentic divineness.
Your non-existence is the categorical condition. For no one can it be relaxed. It is categorical; it is the absolute. You are the barrier. Fall down, and then you know. And only when you know, you know. You cannot understand it; I cannot explain it to you. I cannot make you understand it. So whatever I am saying, I am not saying anything metaphysical. I am only trying to show you that you must begin with yourself.
If you begin with yourself you will end with the divine, because that is your other part, the other pole. But begin from this bank. Do not begin from the other where you are not. You cannot begin from there. Begin from where you are, and the more you will go deep, the less you will be. The more you will know yourself, the less self you will be. And once you have come to a total understanding about yourself, you will be annihilated, you will go into non-existence, you will be totally negative – not. And in that not – in that total negation, you will know the grace which is always falling, which is always raining down from eternity. You will know the love which is always around you. It has always been, but you have not paid any attention to it. Be annihilated, and you will be aware of it.
Once you know Yourself, you will know and understand Krishna’s personality, Truth, Divine, God.
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