18 Aug 2024
[Ms. Thrylokya asked]
Swami replied:- Ego means over-confidence or pride that is developed from the basic ego due to wealth, education, caste, beauty, gender, etc. In the process of eradicating the ego, you should not eradicate the basic ego, which is the identifying address of yourself resulting in depression. You must only eradicate the wrong modification of your basic ego. You must always remember Hanuman and Gopikas in this context.
i) Hanuman:- He is the incarnation of God Shiva, who can destroy this entire creation. In the childhood itself, He swallowed the rising sun mistaking the sun as fruit. What are we before such mighty Hanuman? Even though He is the incarnation of God Shiva, He remained as the permanent servant for His contemporary human incarnation called Rama. If anyone of us were in the place of Hanuman, we would say to Rama “I am the incarnation of Shiva and You are the incarnation of Vishnu. The Veda says that Shiva and Vishnu are one and the same (Śivaśca Nārāyaṇaḥ). Hence, We both are equal. At the best, You can be My friend but not My Master”. Hanuman never even thought like this. He always told Rama that He is the beloved petty servant of Rama. He helped Rama by exhibiting several supernatural powers (and Rama did not do any miracle). But, Hanuman told that Rama is the source of His miraculous powers! Anyone of us in the place of Hanuman will say that he is God and Rama is his devotee!! The Advaita philosopher says that he is the ultimate original God (Brahman) without doing even the smallest trace of the miracle done by Hanuman!!! So, if you remember Hanuman with this background, ego will run away.
ii) Gopikas:- Gopikas were sages for the past millions of births doing penance for God. Even angels fear for sages because the sages can curse even the angels. Such sages left their male gender and became females. They left their higher caste and were born in the lowest cowherd caste. They were the authors of several scriptures and they were born as uneducated. They left male gender, caste and knowledge that cause ego. Before the power and concentration of sages, what is our power and concentration? Such sages born as Gopikas accepted God as husband and wept for Him when He left Brundaavanam forever. If we remember the background of Gopikas, certainly our ego gets eradicated.
Both Hanuman and Gopikas conquered ego based jealousy by which they recognized and surrendered to their contemporary human incarnations. Even Ramakrishna Paramahamsa left the ego of male gender and lived in Brundaavanam for one month in the female dress as Gopika. In this way, by remembering such climax devotees, the soul can conquer ego and its effect called jealousy, which is the only only only hurdle in getting salvation. Due to the repulsion between common human media, the ego based jealousy cuts even your basic identification of the only relevant contemporary human incarnation of God, who alone can give the salvation to any human soul on this earth.
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