Talks Excerpt 511. Swamiji says: You have to remember that you are not the body ALL the time.

From Mother Radha’s recordings of Swamiji.

You are closing your heart in the form of sleep, in the form of laziness, in the form of wandering. You cannot learn like that. You have the time but you are wasting it. But that is your business.

In the Bhagavad Gita Lord Krishna said, ‘I am Time, the all-devourer.’ He devours both vidya and avidya. In the form of laziness and non-concentration he is devouring knowledge and leaving you in more ignorance.

So, watch yourselves. Your deity has come in the form of time, so worship it, take advantage of it.

Swamiji to devotee: Did you see yourself this morning? Devotee: Yes, Swamiji. Swamiji: Where did you see yourself? Devotee: In the mirror. Swamiji: No. You saw your eyes in the mirror. [laughter] It is a very funny thing but you can never see your Self, and yet you say ‘I saw myself, I looked very beautiful.’ Every morning you are doing it.

When you looked in the mirror you forgot what you had learned here – that you are not the body, you are not the mind, you are not the intellect. You are thinking, ‘This is my body, I am designing it. I am making a beautiful coat and putting it on.’

Forget it. You cannot realise God like that. You have to remember that you are not the body all the time.

Sri Ramakrishna used to think, ‘O Lord I don’t know what to say about You. It is better to say nothing, because everything that I say, You are not that.’ We cannot limit God and say that He is only this or that.

People say to me, ‘Swamiji, I am doing so much japa; why is nothing happening?’ I say, ‘What will happen? Nothing will happen. What’s supposed to happen is happening. You think you are the body so it is making you conscious of the body.’ You keep on thinking thoughts like: ‘I have been looking at this body through these eyes for years.’ [Swamiji told us time and again that looking for signs or symptoms of spiritual progress is pointless. That only the Guru can see the internal transformation.]

God is impartial, sooner or later He comes to everyone.

So all this: that you are the self, that you are this, that you are that, that your headache got cured, is not God. No. Every second you must think that you are not the body. Then you will realise that you are the spirit or the Atman.

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.