28 Mar 2023
Question: Treating family life as an obstacle for spiritual life and also as a waste of wealth, etc., can somebody avoid family life?
[Smt. lakshmi lavanya K asked: Namaste Swamy. I want to discuss some points in detail based on Your previous answer, please correct me if I am wrong. God Shiva incarnated as both Hanuman and Radha. I feel Hanuma showed us how to do personal service to God, Radha showed us how to cross Dareshana, Dhaneshana, Putreshana for the sake of God. Here my question is i) if someone doesn't want to marry or doesn't want to have children because they feel husband and children are obstacles in their spiritual life, waste of wealth, time and energy and they want to spend all their time, energy, wealth for God only, is their decision correct?]
Swami replied:- I have explained this point several times, but, unfortunately nobody is catching the basic point. The basic point is that the person addicted to wine and not drinking milk has crossed the phase of right and wrong. In this example, we can continue to argue with the addicted person that what he is doing is completely wrong and we can even threaten him by saying that he will not only be fully destroyed here but also will go to the hell after death. There is perfect ground for us in this case. Take a different case. A person is refusing to drink milk addicted to divine nectar obtained by him due to some unimaginable luck. In this case, can we have even a trace of ground to fight with him regarding right and wrong? Even in the above case of wine, there will be no fruit at all even if we make hectic efforts because of his addiction even though the addiction is totally wrong due to the defect of the objective item (wine). Now, in this example of divine nectar, the objective item has full merits and therefore, in this case we don’t have any ground based on two factors:- i) In the severe addiction, no effort can be fruitful and ii) The objective item has full merits. If you travel in the right path, the goal is to please God and hence, goal (God) is far far more greater than the path. In the addiction to even the wrong goal, worldly right and worldly wrong (Pravrutti) disappears, which we can condemn at least orally. In the addiction to the best goal, we don’t have place even to condemn orally! Such a soul addicted to the best goal is praised by scriptures, angels and sages.
Question: Which one do You prefer? a) No family life with total sacrifice for God; or b) with family life but giving preference to God.
[Smt. lakshmi lavanya K asked: Not having husband/children to spend their total time, energy, money only for God and having husband/ children but giving preference to God without expecting anything in return, are both the same. If not, which do You prefer?]
Swami replied:- The lowest stage is preferring family life only without God. The middle stage is preferring both God and family. The highest stage is only preferring God. All these three stages represent the spiritual journey from world to God called as Aarohana maarga (ascending order of journey). When Ramakrishna Paramahamsa was going from temple (world) to meditation place, called Panchavati (God), a newly married devotee asked Him that he is troubled by his wife for going late to home due to spiritual talks with Paramahamsa. Then Paramahamsa told “leave the wife”. The devotee was in the middle stage and Paramahamsa showed the highest stage to him. He also practiced the highest stage by not even touching His wife. Since the devotee was unable to rise from the middle stage to the highest stage, while returning back (from God to world as incarnation) Paramahamsa consoled him by granting stable position in the middle stage till he becomes capable to reach the third final stage. Paramahamsa told the devotee that thereafter he will not face the problem. This shows that miracles are done by incarnations only to solve problems of real devotees about whom God has full hope of spiritual progress. Miracles are done by a demonic soul for its publicity to enjoy name and fame in the world.
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