What Matters Is Our Consciousness
SPIRITUALITY, 22 Apr 2019
Radhanath Swami – TRANSCEND Media Service
The famous writer Paulo Coelho once said, “There is always a gap between our intention and action.” This holds true in our lives. How we present things or in what ways we present is definitely important and critical, but if we deeply analyze the matter, it’s the intention or consciousness behind it that matters.
In Vedic scriptures the nature of the God is defined as bhava-grahi, i.e. he is interested in the consciousness that we have invested in the service rather than the externals of exactly how it is done. Because of today’s lifestyle that focuses more on external facade, we have lost the essence of giving importance to the motive behind our deeds; rather we focus on the glamorous and peripheral presentation of it.
My spiritual master Srila Prabhupada used to say, “Giving importance to details is a sign of love.” He taught us that if we are striving to serve God and humanity, the best possible way is to get absorbed in our services. Whatever we are doing, we should do with our full heart, with our full consciousness because it is in the service of God and Humanity.
God is the ultimate creator, maintainer, enjoyer, and proprietor of this entire cosmos and everything is emanating from him. So what exactly can we give him? Everything already belongs to him; we are just the caretakers, that too just for time being. So, he will be pleased with our love, and our consciousness; he doesn’t care for other things. It is just like a child who buys a beautiful birthday gift for his father from his father’s money, still the father can feel and appreciate the love and affection of his son through that gift, which he can easily afford himself.
Similar is our relationship with our supreme father and in that relationship it’s not the things that matter but what matters is our consciousness and our attitude. – ________________________________________________________
Radhanath Swami is a Vaishnava sanyassin (a monk in a Krishna-bhakti lineage) and teacher of the devotional path of Bhakti-yoga. He is author of The Journey Home, a memoir of his search for spiritual truth, and the New York Times bestseller The Journey Within. His teachings draw from the sacred texts of India such as The Bhagavad-gita, Srimad Bhagavatam, and Ramayana, and aim to reveal the practical application of the sacred traditions, while focusing on the shared essence which unites apparently disparate religious or spiritual paths. Born Richard Slavin, on December 7, 1950, in his teens he came to confront a deep sense of alienation from suburban Chicago life and the civil injustices of mid-century America. At the age of nineteen, while on a summer trip to Europe, his internal struggles culminated in a commitment to search for God wherever it might lead him. Meditating on the Isle of Crete, he felt a supernatural calling and the next morning set off alone to find spiritual India. The Journey Home documents his odyssey as a penniless hitch-hiker though Greece, Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and finally India. There he lived as a wandering ascetic, first amongst the forest dwelling Himalayan yogis and later amongst a wide variety of gurus and spiritual practitioners throughout India and Nepal. Ultimately, he was led to the holy town of Vrindavan, where he found the teacher he was searching for in A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada (1896-1977) the founder of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON).
Go to Original – radhanathswami.com
Tags: Radhanath Swami, Religion, Spirituality
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