Disc 133 track 7. Swamiji says: God impels and compels you if necessary, but never expels you.

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‘Do you know that if God impels you and you don’t do it, he compels you. But God never expels you!’ – Swami Shivapadananda.

Swamiji is talking about different types of knowledge. Saying that in the secular world, no scientist will ever say they don’t want more knowledge. But the key is to understand that some knowledge is temporary and other knowledge [inner, spiritual] knowledge is permanent or eternal. The one may change; the other never does. 

You can pursue both kinds of knowledge at once. How do you do that whilst you’re studying for your university degree? At the same time, you read the scriptures and discriminate, like you’re discriminating in university. Similarly here, you discriminate. But morning and evening, try to perform the [spiritual] exercises side by side. The revealing part of this kind of knowledge is that as long as you remain stuck on the theoretical basis, it’s worldly knowledge. But this [spiritual] knowledge requires you to be practical. 

I’ll give you an example. We learn something about chemistry at junior school but it doesn’t require you to be practical [and implement it in a laboratory]. It’s complementary to something else. Or will add to it, but in this [spiritual] knowledge that we’re learning, we don’t stop at theoretical. You have to do it yourself. To prove it to yourself. 

No exams are set. You become your own examiner. With outside [secular] knowledge someone else has to examine. But here, you become your own examiner. And because you have become your own examiner, you have to be so truthful that you must pass a judgement on yourself. And it’s not an easy thing to pass a judgement on yourself. 

Swamiji emphasises how external knowledge may require us to be truthful in a factual sense, but the internal knowledge requires truthfulness in thought, word and deed. Because we’re not dealing with someone else. We’re dealing with our own mind and the [higher] Self.

Swamiji quotes Sri Ramakrishna saying that if we speak the truth for twelve years – and here, speaking the truth means that what you think, what you say and what you do are all in alignment, he says that whatever you say, must come true. It becomes vak-siddhi. Swamiji says that not just what you say, but whatever you think will materialise. 

Swamiji uses photographic lens to illustrate the process. It all comes back to concentration and focus. He speaks of the automatic process of the outside being truthful, if the inside is truthful. The outside expression must be the same. 

Circling back, Swamiji says, the starting point is to find out theoretically from the scriptures and other sources, about God. But all will still be in the realm of Maya [partial revelation of truth]. But that concept can be used as a stepping stone to go beyond concept. Most of us are presently stuck in concept.

Swamiji says that a Guru [spiritual preceptor/teacher] is not necessary [please bear in mind the clearly academic audience to whom he’s speaking] because in the Bhagavad Gita Lord Krishna said, ‘I am seated in your heart.’ He himself becomes the guru from inside to impel you.

And do you know that if he impels you and you don’t do it, he compels you. But God never expels you. 

Don’t argue with people about the existence of God or whether they believe in God. Rather go from the perspective of, ‘Okay – you want knowledge.’ You can’t tell him that the purpose of this life is to reach God-realisation. You tell him it’s to attain knowledge. But let’s aim at perfect knowledge. By knowing which, all else is known. [Link]

If you know what one thing is made from, you know what all other things are made from. Example: If I know that something is just a composition of atoms, then everything is atoms [differently composed, manifesting in another state of vibration and therefore appearing to be different.] So, we must stress that knowledge. 

Ramakrishna Bhagavan said that you cannot go on having just knowledge. You need to love to have knowledge. So bhakti is love tempered with knowledge. Otherwise, it’s just emotionalism.

The free-to-read or download, 396 page Flipbook version of Swamiji’s biography is available by clicking HERE. If you’d prefer the PDF version, please click HERE.

These recordings or the excerpts from them, were made from the early 1970s onward, by Mother Radha, a close devotee of Swamiji’s and edited for uploading here by our gurubhai and her son, Brother Tim. Please be mindful that what Swamiji was saying may have been specific to an individual or a group of people with him, at the time.