 68. God Realization |
Difference between sleep and God-realization
In sleep the individual mind continues to exist though it forgets everything including itself, and the latent impressions in the mind are a veil between the submerged consciousness and the Infinite Reality. Thus during sleep consciousness is submerged in the shell of the individual mind, but has not yet been able to emerge out of that shell. So though the soul has forgotten its separateness from God and has attained unity with him, it is unconscious of unity. In God-realization, however, the mind does not merely forget itself but has (with all its impressions) lost its identity; and the consciousness hitherto associated with the individual mind is freed from trammels and brought into direct unity with the Ultimate Reality. Since there is no veil between consciousness and the Ultimate Reality, the soul is fused with the Absolute, and eternally abides in knowledge and bliss.
The manifestation of infinite knowledge and unlimited bliss in consciousness is, however, confined to the soul that has attained God-realization. The Infinite Reality in the God-realized soul has the knowledge of its own Infinity; but such knowledge does not belong to the unrealized soul, still subject to the illusion of the universe. If God-realization were not a personal attainment, the entire universe would come to an end as soon as one man attained God-realization. This does not happen, because God-realization is a personal state of consciousness belonging to the one who has transcended the domain of the mind. Others continue to remain in bondage, and can attain it only by freeing their consciousness from the burden of the ego and the limitations of the individual mind. Thus God-realization has a direct significance only for the one who has emerged from the time-process.
What was latent in the infinite becomes manifest after the attainment of God-realization, the soul discovers that it has always been the Infinite Reality, and that its looking upon itself as finite during the period of evolution and spiritual advancement was an illusion. The soul also finds that the infinite knowledge and bliss that it enjoys have been latent in the Infinite Reality from the beginning of time and that it became manifest at the moment of realization. Thus the God-realized person does not become different from what he was before realization. He remains what he was: the difference that realization makes in him is that while previously he did not consciously know his true nature, he now knows it. He knows that he has never been anything other than what he now knows himself to be, and that he has been through a process of self-discovery.
The process of attaining God-realization is a game in which the beginning and the end are one. The attainment of realization is nevertheless a distinct gain. There are two kinds of advantages. One consists in getting what we did not previously possess; the other consists in realizing what we really are. God-realization is of the second kind. However, there is an infinite difference in the soul that has God-realization and one that has not. Though the soul that has God-realization has nothing it did not already possess, its explicit knowledge makes God-realization of the highest significance. The soul that is not God-realized experiences itself as finite, and is constantly troubled by the opposites of joy and sorrow. But the soul that has realization is lifted out of them and experiences the Infinite.
In God-realization, separate consciousness is discarded and duality is transcended in the abiding knowledge of identity with the Infinite Reality. The world of shadows is at an end and the curtain of illusion is for ever drawn. The distress of the pursuits of limited consciousness is replaced by the tranquillity and bliss of truth-consciousness and the restlessness of temporal existence is swallowed up in the peace of eternity.
