21 Dec 2014
Shri Phani asked “Self-praise is said to be a sin since it gives ego immediately. Of course, ‘I’ indicates the pure awareness or God and concentration of ‘I’ means meditation on God. Please clarify my point”.
Swami replied: “There is no doubt that self-praise brings ego and is a sin. The same self-praise can be used as medicine in the context of lowered self-confidence. The poison of snake is harmful in normal condition. But, the same poison is used in preparing a medicine called ‘Vishaamrutarasa’ (Ayurvedic medicine), which is used in the final stage of viral fever as a medicine. The same poison saves the human being in that special context. Similarly, self-praise brings ego and is harmful to the human being in ordinary condition. But, the same self-praise acts as medicine in the state of lowered self-confidence leading to depression, which on further intensification may lead even to suicide. In this context, you cannot say that the self-praise is a sin. It is not a sin everytime in the case of everybody. If it is a sin always, Hanuman must have not used it. The self-depression effects even the physical health. Food, body and mind are inter-related even as per the modern medical science. Even the pure awareness is also related to food. If food is not given, the inert energy is not generated, which enters nervous system and generates the pure awareness. Mind is a specific faculty or deign of pure awareness. On fasting, the mind disappears and slowly the pure awareness also disappears resulting in death. Self-praise is inevitable when you are alone. You can use the medicine prescribed by the doctor from your medical shop itself. If your friend or preacher is with you, he will raise your confidence by praising you. The same medicine can be given by the doctor or nurse also. Hanuman was alone in Lanka and hence, He praised Himself. In Lanka, even Sita praised Him by saying that He is courageous and capable (Vikraantastvam…). She improved the self-confidence of Hanuman so that Hanuman could burn Lanka. When Arjuna went in to the state of depression, Krishna gave the right analysis in the form of the Gita. Krishna also raised the self-confidence in Arjuna by saying that Krishna Himself is Arjuna (Pandavanam Dhanamjayah) and saying that Arjuna is born with all the divine qualities (Maashuchah…).
Concentration on ‘I’ means that you should analyze about ‘I’. If the teacher says that you should concentrate on physics, it does not mean that you should meditate or praise the Physics. It only means that you should deeply study the subject of Physics. Similarly, concentration on ‘I’ means that you should analyze the concept of ‘I’. When it is said that ‘I’ has a source, it clearly means that ‘I’ is not the ultimate source or God. Since, the source of ‘I’ is not revealed, it only means that source of ‘I’ is the unimaginable God. You may think that in such case it must be said that the source of ‘I’ should be concentrated upon. It is not told so because the source of ‘I’ cannot be concentrated upon since it is unimaginable. Concentration need not mean praise and meditation. It may also mean that you should analyze deeply about ‘I’, which is not actually God but appears to be God due to some misinterpretations. A thief appearing as a gentleman should be also concentrated upon in the sense that such a person should be detected through deep analysis. The intensive analysis shows that even the pure awareness is not eternal, which depends on the supply of inert energy generated from food. If you take the word ‘I’ uttered by human incarnation like Krishna, you should concentrate on that ‘I’. Such ‘I’ denotes the unimaginable God present in Krishna. Since such God cannot be meditated upon, you have to meditate only upon the external form of Krishna since God identifies with the external form also. Concentration of ‘I’ does not mean only the ‘I’ used by you. It can be also the ‘I’ used by Human form of God. Therefore, concentration on ‘I’ means
All these conclusions are indicated by the word concentration and you should not limit this word to the ‘I’ used by you only and say that the ‘I’ used by every ordinary human being like you is to be meditated upon as God. If you want to say that ‘I’ is God, you should limit this ‘I’ only to the ‘I’ used by the human incarnation or God. The ‘I’ used by you means only the pure awareness generated by food and in such case, ‘I’ is only a part of the creation and not God. You should also remember that the way of Shankara clearly says that ‘I’ belongs to God and ‘you’ belong to the individual soul. It means that the ‘I’ used by God should be taken as God and the ‘you’ used by God, to denote the ordinary souls other than Himself (God), should be taken as the created items and not God. The whole terminology should be taken with reference to God only everywhere. ‘I’ is always singular, which denotes the one God. You can be singular or plural denoting one soul or the multiple souls.
★ ★ ★ ★ ★