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Vedanta Sandesh
Feb 2020
Year - 25 Issue-8
Cover Page
The cover page of the Feb 2020 issue of Vedanta Sandesh is yet
another beautiful bird of India - the Common Kngfisher (Alcedo atthis). The
common kingfisher is widely distributed over Europe, Asia, and North Africa.
Common Kingfisher is also known as the Eurasian kingfisher, River
Kingfisher and also Small Blue Kingfisher. This sparrow-sized bird has the
typical short-tailed, large-head, blue upperparts, orange underparts and a
long bill. It feeds mainly on fish, caught by diving, and has special visual
adaptations to enable it to see prey under water. The female is identical in
appearance to the male except that her lower mandible is orange-red with a
black tip. It is easily detected once its high, shrill whistled call is learned, even
if the bird itself is hidden.
Like all kingfishers, the common kingfisher is highly territorial;
since it must eat around 60% of its body weight each day, it is essential to
have control of a suitable stretch of river. It is solitary for most of the year,
roosting alone in heavy cover. If another kingfisher enters its territory, both
birds display from perches, and fights may occur, in which a bird will grab the
other's beak and try to hold it under water.
This beautiful cover page pic was clicked by Poojya Guruji Swami
Atmanandaji at a water body near Jayanti Mata Mandir, Barwah (MP).
Om Namah Shivaya.
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CONTENTS Vedanta Sandesh
Feb 2020
1. Shloka 5
4. Letter 13-14
7. Jivanmukta 26-28
11. Links 44
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Monthly eMagazine of Vedanta Mission
Feb 2020 : Year 25 / Issue 8
Published by
Vedanta Mission
Vedanta Ashram, E/2948, Sudama Nagar,
Indore-452009 (M.P.) India
http://www.vmission.org.in / vmission@gmail.com
Editor:
Swamini
Samatananda
Saraswati
V edanta Sandes h
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fr;Zxw/oZe/k% iw.kZa
lfPpnkuUne};e~A
vuUra fuR;esda ;r~
rn~czãsR;o/kkj;sr~AA
Know that to be Brahman - Which is all over - up, down,
and on the surface; it is of the nature of blissful, self-efful-
gent existence. It is infinite, eternal, and one non-dual truth.
see world and its objects and people we do not really see them. Ignorance and
the subsequent notions make us terribily self-centered and self-obsessed. When
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we do not even see the world, how can we ever see the inherent beauty & divinity
in all. So the first step has to be to learn to properly see.
One should take up ‘seeing’ as a sadhana. Aim to first see the world as
it is, not how each one of us like etc. The entire world is one complex whole.
Everything has an extremely important role to play in the existence of the crea-
tion. Nothing, howsoever small or petty it may seem, has an important place in
the whole scheme of things. No wonder God has taken time to create it. We need
not bother what all role a particular thing plays. It is sufficient to believe that the
very fact the creator has created it shows its importance. If at all we can appreci-
ate the exact role a thing plays, then it is a blessing. However, we may become
aware of one small aspect, but it may have many other roles to play. So start with
the humility of ignorance and learn to see everything as innocently and fully as a
child. Look how intensely a child looks at the world - wide-eyed. Then alone he or
she learns.
So we begin by sitting down quietly, free from our wants, likes & dislikes
and then just look at the world - as it is. What do we see? We see different things
& people. Everyone is unique, and everyone has an important place in the whole
scheme of things. Everything is so interconnected that without anyone something
goes missing. As the human colonies grow, we cut trees, and as we keep on cre-
ating the cement jungles, we realize the importance of clean air and the lively &
chirpy ambiance created by trees. What one tree can do no human creation can
ever do. So also the streams, the birds, the animals etc. All these may be beauti-
ful by themselves but we slowly see something more. They all are facilitating our
very existence. They all are so self-sustaining and blessed that it is not an under-
statement to say that verily God himself has manifested as them. This is true for
everything. Gita tells us to learn to see holistically - kayen, manasa buddhya ...
learn to see not merely with your eyes, but also with your heart & intellect. Once
we learn to see, then alone we shall get appropriate lessons. God is here & now,
as everything. We just need the art of seeing everything properly.
V edanta Sandes h
Om Tat Sat.
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Sadhana
Panchakam
- : 5: -
V edanta Sandes h
Swamini Samatananda
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Sadhana Panchakam
vkResPNk O;olh;rke~%
Have a strong desire to know the ‘Self ’
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Sadhana Panchakam
And with this realization one also comes to realize his own igno-
rance about the truth of life. Realization of one’s own ignorance
is always the greatest blessing and a turning point in any person’s
life. Realization of ignorance alone brings about the desire to get
the right knowledge. The scriptures are constantly revealing to
us that not only is a mortal human being ignorant of one’s true
nature but there is a serious misunderstanding too. Just like that
of seeing a snake in a rope. Once a person imagines a snake then
further imaginary fears are bound to arise. Realization of one’s
ignorance frees us from arrogance and brings about a humble de-
sire to learn. Having this realization the Acharya goes on to say-
Aatmeccha vyavaseeyataam-Have the desire to know thy self.
Solve the riddle-Who am I? Where have I come from, where will
I go? What is the true nature of myself ? Ironically I is the most
used and yet the most abused word. What ever we do everything
revolves around the I. All that I do, all that I attain, it is for
this I but do I really know who am I? Thus Aatmeccha Vyava-
seeyataam-Have a strong desire, a strong resolve, to know the
true nature of the Self. May this desire be as strong as your pas-
sions towards worldly pleasures.
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Sadhana Panchakam
All that needs to be done is to awaken to this truth and free one’s
self of the process of becoming. Enquire upon who wants to
become something? Who is the seeker, who is the enjoyer? Know
that truth knowing which nothing else remains to be known.
Know that essence of the entire cosmos. This is what our scrip-
tures thunder. The desir to know the truth breaks all the shackles
of bondage and opens the doors to liberation.
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Mail from
Poojya Guruji
Celebrating Mahashivratri
What do we do in Mahashivratri?
Well, to begin with devote one day for Bhagwan Shiva. Worship
him, pray to him, do the Japa of Om Namah Shivaya, and meditate
on him. Thanks him for all what hehas blessed you with. Make it is
a different kind of day. Nowadays we have days reserved for all
our near & dear ones. Reserve this day for your beloved God. If
possible take a break from your work and change food choices on
that day. Make it just natural foods. Simple, light and as less as
possible. Let your stomach also have a holiday. Abstain from sensu-
al gratification on that day. Just be yourself, filled with gratitude
& blessedness, and thank God.
On Mahasivratri day:
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1. Get up early. Have bath and have some light exercises.
2. Take some Lime water (Nimbu-Pani) and if required some tea.
3. Sit down for Japa of three malas of ‘Om Namah Shivaya’ mantra.
Then meditate on Shivji as your very Atma, preferably using the
first shloka of Pratah Smaran Statotram.
4. Go for a walk in some clean & green place. Do some pranayama &
Surya-Namaskar there.
5. Come and take some fruits, two bananas and an Apple will be
ideal.
6. Prepare for puja by getting fresh flowers yourself, prepare
some Naivedya and then do abhishek of Shivji - an elaborate puja.
7. Chant Shic Stotras like Shiv-Panchakshar / Rudrashatakam /
Shiv Mahimna Stotra etc.
8. Do three more malas of Om Namah Shivaya mantra.
9. Afternoon take some fruits again and Nimbu-Pani. Some But-
ter-Milk should also be taken.
10. Take some rest. some sleep.
11. Get up fresh and after a cup of tea / some orange juice - chant
Kaivalya Upanishad.
12. Do three more Malas of Om Namah Shivaya mantra.
13. Evening go for darshan of Shivji to some Mandir outside.
14. Sit down with your family & friends and sing some Shiv Bhajans.
15. Have some light Phalahari dinner.
16. Do one more puja in the night and then three malas of ONS
mantra.
17. End your day with meditation on Shivji - as your very Atma.
18. Feeling blessed - call it a day, and go to sleep.
This routine will definitely help you. After puja you can pray for
the fulfillment of any desires - for yourself, your family and also
for the world at large.
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Gita Reflections
vkiw;Zek.kepyizfr"Ba
leqnzeki% izfo’kfUr ;}r~A
r}Rdkek ;a izfo’kfUr losZ
l 'kkfUrekIuksfr u dkedkehAA
V edanta Sandes h
(Gita 2/70)
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Aapooryamaanam...
(vkiw;Zek.kepyizfr"Ba------)
Swamini Samatananda
Just as waters flow into the Ocean that is brimful and still, so too the wise
person into whom all objects enter gains peace (remains unchanged); whereas
the desirer of objects does not (gain peace).
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Gita Reflections
T his sloka from the second chapter of Srimad
Bhagwadgeeta is one of the concluding slokas of the Sthitaprag-
ya section, or the entire second chapter in general. The sthitap-
ragya section is a beautiful word painting of a Man of steady
wisdom which Bhagwan Sri Krishna creates as He satisfies the
curiosity of Arjuna who wishes to know the nature of a Man of
steady wisdom, how he lives with his own-self and amidst the
humdrum of various situations and objects. Answering Arjuna’s
questions Sri Krishna goes on to give a vivid understanding of a
wise man. This beautiful and vivid explanataion is the most in-
spiring explanations ever invoking a heart-thumping and intense
desire in the mind of a sincere spiritual seeker to awaken into a
similar state of equipoise and steady wisdom of the true nature
of the Self.
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Gita Reflections
Aapooryamaanam: The ocean is completely filled with water to
the brim. It does not reqire any more water to make it full. This is
a great example of something which is fulfilled by itself and does
not depend on any other source to fulfill it. If we look at other
bodies of water, a lake, a pond or a river, they are all dependent on
some external source of water. Unlike the ocean all these water
bodies depend on the rains or pumped water to be full. Not only
this, a pond or a river overflows with water in case of heavy rains
and dry up in case there are no rains. On the other hand rivers
are constantly merging their waters into the ocean, the rains too
pour down their waters into the ocean, but the ocean never over-
flows. Neither does it dry up in case there is no rainfall or if no
rivers merge into it. This is a unique quality of an ocean. Giving
this illustration, Sri Krishna says that a Man of wisdom too rev-
els in his full glory of fulfilled and blissful existence. He does not
depend on any extraneous pleasures to fulfill it. He is contented
by himself and within himself. At the same time He is neither
elated with joy or low with sorrow in case he is experiencing
the various objects of the world. Neither does he feel any sense
of vaccum in case he is not mingling with the senses and their
objects. At all times he revels in his blissful glory of self-content-
ment. The abidance in his self-knowledge is such that even as he
interacts with the world there is neither attachment nor aversion.
The relationship with the objective world is that of a Master who
is enlightened about the truth of the world. He is truly like that
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Gita Reflections
essential source of water in which the oceanic waves dance and
play in their glory. There may be joyful waves at times, at times
there will be a meditative silence. Sometimes the waves jump with
ecstatic joy and sometimes small waves of innocent smiles. With
all this show going on there is no effect on the water in any way
and so too in the life of an awakened man of wisdom.
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- 23-
The Art Of Man Making
Man Of Perfection
Secretfulness in Self-Control
P.P. Gurudev
Swami Chinmayanandaji
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The Art of Man Making
L ord Krishna gives us a very striking ex-
ample to bring home, in all its tragic vividness, the wasteful
self-destruction of the life of one who has no self-control.
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The Art of Man Making
dangers, and give it a direction and a definite harbour to reach,
True, a rudderless ship, with its captain dead, on the open seas,
becomes a plaything to be tossed about by the whimsical winds,
to founder no self-control and dash against an useen rock. So
too the life of a man of no self-control wrecks and founders,
achieving nothing, reaching nowhere, sinking into the slimes
of a watery grave. Man, a promising young man, who would
perhaps have reached dizzy heights and climbed to shine in his
achievements, is laid low in disease and death by his own wild
passions and stormy lusts. Any young man of ambition must
guard against the inner death, by consciously living a disci-
plined life of constant seeking for purposeful goal and heroi-
cally pursuing a shining ideal. Such a life alone is worthwhile;
such indeed is the story of all men who had contributed to life,
and whose name History will never willingly let die.
Now the intelligent sceptic may ask, what is the use of a life
that can eke out from the sense objects are denied? Would such
an empty and barren life be worth living?
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The Art of Man Making
is night to all beings, to that the self-controlled man is awake;
that to which is night to all beings, to that the the self-con-
trolled man is awake; that to which all beings are awake, is night
to the man of perfection. In short, ordinary people, who live in
the excitement and perspirationof sense gratification can never
comprehend the fuller joys and ampler bliss enjoyed by aman
of self-control. It is also conversely true that a man of serious
reflection (Muni) who, as a result of his undertastanding, has
risen above the tumultous world of seething lusts and sweating
passions, does not live in our familiar world of ego and egocen-
tric desires, longings and attachments. Men of thought (Mu-
nis) do not live and suffer our level of consciousness and its
vulgar incompetence. We accept the baser state of existence,
seeking power, wealth and sensual satisfaction all utterly self-
ish and arrogantly self-centred. Such a life creates restlessness
within and tensions without. We create our own psychedellic
pains and sorrows by wrong thinking and false ways of living.
This pseudo-world of make-belief joys, of immoral successes,
transitory pains and pangs is unknown to the man of self-con-
trol. “The man of reflection sees it as night” (sa nisha pashyato
munehe). But then, is not a man of wisdom living even after at-
taining perfection in this very same world where we are? Will
not the objects around him shoot beams of temptations into
him and generate in his heart desires? Once the desire is born,
is he not thereafter as plastic a clay as we are all now? Krishna
answers all these . *As unto the brimful and still ocean flow
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The Art of Man Making
the the waters, so is the Muni into whom desires flow-he, not a
desirer of desires, attains peace.
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The Art of Man Making
ing, giving up toally all desires, and lives without the twin self-
ish ideas of “I” and “Mine”, he indeed attains to peace.
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Jivanmukta
Wandering In
Himalayas
84
Pashupathinath
Swami Tapovanji
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Jivanmukta
Jnana
“O h men, lying immersed in the sleep of igno-
rance from time without beginning, arise, awake from this sleep
of illusion. Seek and find noble teachers and learn directly from
them the truth about the Soul.” Like a loving mother, the Shruti
admonishes us tenderly to wake up from the terrible sleep of ig-
norance which is the sources of all sorrows and calamities, that
is to eradicate ignorance completely. The Shruti also ensures us
that the only means of destroying ignorance is the attainment
of the knowledge of the Self. So it is clear, that there is no other
road to salvation. To the mansion of liberation there is no en-
trance except through jnana. Bhakti and yoga lead man to the
door of jnana, and not directly to the Home of Salvation. The
darkness of ignorance lifts only upon the rising sun, jnana, not
on the appearance of the stars like Bhakti.
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Jivanmukta
related to egoism is ajnana; when the I -consciousness ends, it
is jnana.
How does this jnana originate? How does a man who identifies
himself with the body and thinks, “I am rich, I am happy” or, “
I am poor, I am unhappy” turn away from this immoral world-
ly life and enter that life of the Soul with the thought, “I am
Brahman, the bodyless, ageless, deathless Bliss”? Inquiry into
Truth, carried on with the help of holy men, is the chief means
of attaining true knowledge. All the great teachers of the past
unanimously hold sannyasa, which means the renunciation of
all action, to be an essential element of spritual contemplation.
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STORY
Section
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Rameshwaram
S ignifying the celebrartion of victory
following the devastation of Demon Ravana and his clan, Lord
Rama performed the installation of Shiva Linga in gratitude
and dutiful homage to Maha Deva. Having crossed the ‘Setu
bandhana’ or the bridge across the Sea, Rama decided to install
the Linga after prayers at Varanasi and asked Hanumana to
worship Lord Vishwesvara and bring a fascimile of the Kashi
Linga for installation but since Hanumana could not return by
the Muhurta or the Exact Time of Auspiciousness, Devi Sita
improvised a Linga Swarupa out of Sea-shore Sand and it was
consecrated formally amid the chanting of Veda Mantras. On
return, Hanuman was disturbed that he could not bring the
Kashi Linga and tried to remove the ‘temporary’ Shiva Lin-
ga and tried his best to replace it with what he brought from
Kashi but could not; instead a seperate Linga was installed in
the vicinity of the Sand Linga. There are thirty six Tirthas
or Water-wells around the Temple-twenty within the Temple
Complex itself and all of these are stated to possess medicinal
properties. It is customary that several devotees take bath from
the water-wells and walk with wet clothes into the nearness of
the Jyotirlinga for ‘Darshan’ worship it.
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Mission & Ashram News
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Mission News
Gita Gyana Yagna, Vadodra
6th-12th Jan2020
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Mission News
Gita Gyana Yagna, Vadodra
7th Jan2020
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Mission News
Gita Gyana Yagna, Lucknow
6th-12th Jan2020
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Mission News
Gita Gyana Yagna, Lucknow
6th-12th Jan2020
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Mission News
Visit to Gaushala in Atmajyoti Ashram
7th Jan2020
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Ashram News
Sundarkand Path
Vedanta Ashram-Indore
Vedanta Ashram-Indore
P. Swamini Poornanandaji
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Visit us online :
International Vedanta Mission
Published by:
International Vedanta Mission
Editor:
Swamini Samatananda Saraswati
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