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New to Advaita Vedanta, seeking clarification

SeRe

Member
Generally the Hindu members of this forum do not like to mix Hindu and Christian philosophies. This creates 'varna sankara' (bustard) philosophies. Neither here nor there. To answer your questions:

1. Prarabhda would be of concern to those who believe in reincarnation/rebirth. Since I do not even believe in birth and death, I am not afraid of that. But, if I were to speak as a theist, Prarabhda cannot be changed. Can you change history?
2. Ramana talked as per his understanding, each one of us talks as per our own understanding. Never take the words of a renowned personality as 'God's own truth'. He also was a human just like us. That is what Buddha talked about in his 'Kesamutti' Sutta (commonly known as Kalama Sutta):

Do not go by ..
upon another's seeming ability (bhabba-rūpatāya),
upon the consideration, The monk is our teacher (samaṇo no garū)

3. How can you meddle with your karma? What has been done is done. As I said, you can't change history. You can only take care of what you are doing now or what you may do in future.

I'm not mixing philosophies. I've just seen both working, and i want to know how they tie together. As you rightly mentioned, I'm trying to find the approach that is right for me. At this point, I'm just collecting information.

Were you always an atheist? Are you an atheist or still agnostic?
 

SeRe

Member
By "in life," are you meaning life in this perceived reality? If so, it's important to note that choice is no more illusory as life itself. Choices one makes in this perceived reality impact one's prarabdha karma as it pertains to how long one "chooses" to remain in samsara.
If life, choices and everything else is an illusion, how does one think and what does one do?
 

SeRe

Member
I know you weren't speaking to me, but I'm compelled to point out that there are many that follow both the path of bhakti yoga (the path of devotion) and the path of jnana yoga (that path of knowledge [commonly associated with Advaita Vedanta]) concurrently. While I am on the latter, I see no conflict with following both paths simultaneously.
This is how I see it now. I believe God exists (also believe God is one entity, so Ganesha, Krishna, Shiva, Parvati devi are all forms of the same paramatma). I see myself as an atma / soul, on a journey through different lives trying to burn all my sanchita karma, till I have none left, and can merge back into the supreme God. I suppose this does not qualify as advaita, and I don't know what this is.

Edit - Actually, on second thoughts, I don't know which theory to believe. At the moment, the above is how I see it. But it may change depending on the knowledge I gain.
 
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Valjean

Veteran Member
Premium Member
If life, choices and everything else is an illusion, how does one think and what does one do?
We think and do things in dream-state, don't we?
Waking-state is just another level of dream. Like our nighttime dreams, their illusory nature will be immediately apparent when we 'wake' to another state.

At the highest state we don't really think, it's more similar to an awareness, and there is no time, motion or change, so nothing to do.
 

SeRe

Member
We think and do things in dream-state, don't we?
Waking-state is just another level of dream. Like our nighttime dreams, their illusory nature will be immediately apparent when we 'wake' to another state.

At the highest state we don't really think, it's more similar to an awareness, and there is no time, motion or change, so nothing to do.
I understand what you are saying.

This discussion can confused me even more than when I started! Advaita vedanta is not simple to follow at all. Now I need to sort out my thoughts to try to figure out what I'm actually trying to understand.
 
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Valjean

Veteran Member
Premium Member
Yes, Advaita Vedanta is a whole different way of looking at reality. It's completely counterintuitive. It's beyond the capacity of our senses to observe or out waking-state consciousness to comprehend. It can be experienced/comprehended only in altered states.
It can be described, from 3rd- state, only by advanced theoretical physics -- which is just as inaccessible to most of us as the experience.
 

SeRe

Member
Yes, Advaita Vedanta is a whole different way of looking at reality. It's completely counterintuitive. It's beyond the capacity of our senses to observe or out waking-state consciousness to comprehend. It can be experienced/comprehended only in altered states.
It can be described, from 3rd- state, only by advanced theoretical physics -- which is just as inaccessible to most of us as the experience.

That's why I think I should move on and try to find another philosophy that my simple mind can understand :)
 

sayak83

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
Hello All, I'm very new to the teachings of Advaita Vedanta, and Ramana Maharshi, so please be patient with me. I came across the following:

  1. Ramana Maharshi's note to his mother: The Ordainer controls the fate of souls in accordance with their past deeds. Whatever is destined not to happen will not happen, try how hard you may. Whatever is destined to happen will happen, do what you may to stop it. This is certain. The best course, therefore, is to remain silent.

  2. From 'Day by Day with Bhagavan'
    Question: "Are our prayers granted?"
    Bhagavan Sri Ramana : "Yes, they are granted. No thought will go in vain. Every thought will produce its effect some time or other. Thought-force will never go in vain."
My question is, how can both be true? Suppose a person wants a job at XYZ company, but it is not in his destiny. He still prays to God for it, and according to the above, God grants it.

I am very new to this subject, so I posted here. I understand that the ultimate goal of Advaita Vedanta is to rise above the maya of this world and recognize/merge with the self. I'm just trying to understand the basics.

Also, I came across this answer from an Advaita Vedanta expert in a Q&A on the subject of law of attraction here: Questions and Answers

Yes, following the 'law of attraction' may well help the person that you take yourself to be to achieve your ambitions but, as you saw in the book (How to Meet Yourself), you are then simply brought to the realisation that you are still unfulfilled. This is inevitably so because you are not the person. Who you appear to be in the dream may find the buried treasure and marry the beautiful girl but all is seen to be worthless when you wake up. And it is no different in so-called 'real' life, because that, too, is effectively a dream.

Again, my question is, how can the law of attraction, and unchangeable destiny (lack of free will) be true at the same time?

Thanks in advance!

PS- I really need to know the answer to this question, so I have also posted it in another forum.
Hinduism generally believes in a constrained form of free will. Your actions from this life and those before constrain your present situation and choices. But there is always some freedom in the actions one take and the attitude one brings in while taking those actions. Through wise choices, one slowly entangles oneself from past habits and constraints until one becomes fully free... a jivanmukta. A fully liberated individual has unrestricted freedom of action as all past bondage has been dissolved.

Prayers as actions create an effect that had consequence in future. However, this does not mean that the prayer itself is granted. Even when a prayer seems to have been granted, the ultimate reason will be found to lie in the actions of the person. But prayers pertaining to material desires are borne out of maya and their results, if any, are fickle and unpredictable like the rest of maya. So one trusts such things at ones peril.
I have never heard of the law of attraction.
 

sayak83

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
You are correct that Neville Goddard is a christian metaphysician. I have copied and pasted some text below from one of his lectures that explains his thinking and main teaching:

From BRAZEN IMPUDENCE:

A new idea will not become part of your common currency of thought until it has been repeated over and over and you begin to live by it.

You have been taught to believe that God exists outside of you, but I say you are all Imagination. That God exists in us and we in him. That our eternal body is the Imagination, and that is God Himself. I mean every word I have just said, but it is a new thought. Until this new idea becomes a part of your thinking, every time you hear the word, “God,” your mind will go out to something you have conceived God to be.

I will now share with you a very personal story. I tell it to illustrate a principle. Society blamed this lady for what she did, and she paid the price, but I was the cause of her misfortune. I am not going to justify my story and if you can’t take it, I’m sorry. When I first told it, one lady was very upset and I regret that; but I have noticed that when someone has recently given up alcohol, tobacco, meat, or sex, they invariably condemn the state. They feel too close to it to feel secure. I am not saying that this lady had a similar experience where she was the victim; I am only speaking of a principle. Now here is my story:

When I decided to marry the lady who now bears my name I applied this principle. At the time I was terribly involved. I had married at the age of eighteen and became a father at nineteen. We separated that year, but I never sought a divorce; therefore, my separation was not legal in the state of New York. Sixteen years later, when I fell in love and wanted to marry my present wife, I decided to sleep as though we were married. While sleeping, physically in my hotel room, I slept imaginatively in an apartment, she in one bed and I in the other. My dancing partner did not want me to marry, so she told my wife that I would be seeking a divorce and to make herself scarce - which she did, taking up residence in another state. But I persisted! Night after night I slept in the assumption that I was happily married to the girl I love.

Within a week I received a call requesting me to be in court the next Tuesday morning at 10:00 A.M.. Giving me no reason why I should be there, I dismissed the request, thinking it was a hoax played on me by a friend. So the next Tuesday morning at 9:30 A.M. I was unshaved and only casually dressed, when the phone rang and a lady said: "It would be to your advantage, as a public figure, to be in court this morning, as your wife is on trial." What a shock! I quickly thanked the lady, caught a taxi, and arrived just as court began. My wife had been caught lifting a few items from a store in New York City, which she had not paid for. Asking to speak on her behalf I said: "She is my wife and the mother of my son. Although we have been separated for sixteen years, as far as I know she has never done this before and I do not think she will ever do it again. We have a marvelous son. Please do nothing to her to reflect in any way upon our son, who lives with me. If I may say something, she is eight years my senior and may be passing through a certain emotional state which prompted her to do what she did. If you must sentence her, then please suspend it." The judge then said to me, "In all of my years on the bench I have never heard an appeal like this. Your wife tells me you want a divorce, and here you could have tangible evidence for it, yet you plead for her release." He then sentenced her for six months and suspended the sentence. My wife waited for me at the back of the room and said: "Neville, that was a decent thing to do. Give me the subpoena and I will sign it." We took a taxi together and I did that which was not legal: I served my own subpoena and she signed it.

Now, who was the cause of her misfortune? She lived in another state, but came to New York City to do an act for which she was to be caught and tried. So I say: every being in the world will serve your purpose, so in the end you will say: "Father forgive them, for they know not what they do." They will move under compulsion to do your will, just as my wife did.

I tell this story only to illustrate a principle. You do not need to ask anyone to aid you in the answer to a prayer, for the simple reason that God is omnipotent and omniscient. He is in you as your own wonderful IAmness. Everyone on the outside is your servant, your slave, ready and able to do your will. All you need do is know what you want. Construct a scene which would imply the fulfillment of your desire. Enter the scene and remain there. If your imaginal counselor (your feeling of fulfillment) agrees with that which is used to illustrate your fulfilled desire, your fantasy will become a fact. If it does not, start all over again by creating a new scene and enter it. It costs you nothing to imagine consciously!

In my own case the scene was a bedroom of an apartment, with my wife in one bed and I in the other, denoting that I was no longer living in a hotel alone. I fell asleep in that state, and within one week I had the necessary papers to start action on a divorce.

This is what the Bible teaches. It is my text book. "Whatever you desire, believe you have already received it and you will!"

There is no limit to the power of belief or to the possibilities of prayer, but you must be brazenly impudent and not take No for an answer. Try it! When I say you are all imagination, I mean it. While standing here on the platform I can, in a split-second, imagine I am standing on the outside, looking at this building. Or, in another second be in London and view the world from there. You say that’s all hallucination? That it is all in my imagination?


Neville's followers have obtained great success after following his techniques. They have manifested jobs, partners, money, fame etc. I want to try it, but I'm afraid of karmic implications, if any. I asked this question but my question was removed from the Neville forum.

I hope you now understand what I am trying to ask you.
1. Is prarabdha karma changeable?
2. If yes, then why did Ramana Maharshi say that it is not?
3. Does "meddling" with your karma create more karma or result in implications?

Thank you!
This is the opposite of what Vedanta teaches. So I cannot recommend it. Vedanta asks us to look at truth, no matter how harsh it might be. Imagination has its own place, but truth should be the central focus of life... a hunger to hold on to that which is True and Real against all that is illusory and appearance. Reality can be changed only through actions that are done with the mindset of service to the world. That is how Gandhi, or Martin Luther or Mandela changed their circumstances. That is the path of Vedanta. The other path seems more like Trump. Believing a lie or a fiction as that makes one feel better. I advice against such delusion based approach.
 

SeRe

Member
This is the opposite of what Vedanta teaches. So I cannot recommend it. Vedanta asks us to look at truth, no matter how harsh it might be. Imagination has its own place, but truth should be the central focus of life... a hunger to hold on to that which is True and Real against all that is illusory and appearance. Reality can be changed only through actions that are done with the mindset of service to the world. That is how Gandhi, or Martin Luther or Mandela changed their circumstances. That is the path of Vedanta. The other path seems more like Trump. Believing a lie or a fiction as that makes one feel better. I advice against such delusion based approach.

Reality can be changed only through actions that are done with the mindset of service to the world. That is how Gandhi, or Martin Luther or Mandela changed their circumstances.

Can you please explain what you mean? How did they do this? I also want to be of service to the world, especially improve the living conditions of animals.
 

SeRe

Member
Hinduism generally believes in a constrained form of free will. Your actions from this life and those before constrain your present situation and choices. But there is always some freedom in the actions one take and the attitude one brings in while taking those actions. Through wise choices, one slowly entangles oneself from past habits and constraints until one becomes fully free... a jivanmukta. A fully liberated individual has unrestricted freedom of action as all past bondage has been dissolved.

Prayers as actions create an effect that had consequence in future. However, this does not mean that the prayer itself is granted. Even when a prayer seems to have been granted, the ultimate reason will be found to lie in the actions of the person. But prayers pertaining to material desires are borne out of maya and their results, if any, are fickle and unpredictable like the rest of maya. So one trusts such things at ones peril.
I have never heard of the law of attraction.

Thank you. The law of attraction is nothing but positive thinking. Can you please take a look at my thread here and respond: Prarabdha and positive thinking
 

Aupmanyav

Be your own guru
:D As an atheist, do you believe in positive thinking?
As an atheist and an advaitist, I NEVER have any negative thought.
Were you always an atheist? Are you an atheist or still agnostic?
I was a wavering theist for half my life. I was never an agnostic. I do not like that stance. I am a strong atheist now, not believing even in the possibility of existence of God or anything supernatural.
 

sayak83

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
Reality can be changed only through actions that are done with the mindset of service to the world. That is how Gandhi, or Martin Luther or Mandela changed their circumstances.

Can you please explain what you mean? How did they do this? I also want to be of service to the world, especially improve the living conditions of animals.
Well, Gandhi went as a lawyer to South Africa for a living. But when he saw the systemic racism his fellow Indians were suffering, he started to represent their cause pro-bono in the courts as a service. From there his actions slowly led to the Indian independence struggle and the gaining of Independence for India.
 

sayak83

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
Reality can be changed only through actions that are done with the mindset of service to the world. That is how Gandhi, or Martin Luther or Mandela changed their circumstances.

Can you please explain what you mean? How did they do this? I also want to be of service to the world, especially improve the living conditions of animals.
Here is an article that may be illuminating.
Secret of work
 

SalixIncendium

अग्निविलोवनन्दः
Staff member
Premium Member
If life, choices and everything else is an illusion, how does one think and what does one do?

Once one realizes their true nature as Atman and not this body/mind complex, one works toward stabilizing oneself in that knowledge. One still participates in worldly affairs, but from an entirely different perspective.
 

SeRe

Member
As an atheist and an advaitist, I NEVER have any negative thought.I was a wavering theist for half my life. I was never an agnostic. I do not like that stance. I am a strong atheist now, not believing even in the possibility of existence of God or anything supernatural.

As an atheist, do you have positive thoughts? I wish I were like you and didn't have negative thoughts.
 

SeRe

Member
Once one realizes their true nature as Atman and not this body/mind complex, one works toward stabilizing oneself in that knowledge. One still participates in worldly affairs, but from an entirely different perspective.

How does a follower of Advaita Vedanta react to some really great event? For example, winning the lottery or realizing a lifelong dream?

Being neutral is an easier attitude to adopt when one is sad, right?
 

JustGeorge

Not As Much Fun As I Look
Staff member
Premium Member
How does a follower of Advaita Vedanta react to some really great event? For example, winning the lottery or realizing a lifelong dream?

Being neutral is an easier attitude to adopt when one is sad, right?

Easier? No, none of it's easy.

And it's not so much as being neutral, as being stable, in my mind. One can internalize a feeling or sadness or joy, but it's important not to become attached to the feeling. Regardless of what it is, the one thing that is certain is it will not last. If time heals a broken heart, time can erase ecstasy as well.

Experience the sensation in the moment, and let it go.

In The Bhagavad Gita For Daily Living by Eknath Easwaran, he mentions repetitively in the three volumes not to let the sense(or emotions)agitate you. The more excited(negative or positive) you become, the more you will have to mentally swing the other way to balance yourself out. For example, the hysteria from winning the lottery might feel great for awhile, but eventually reality will set in and the troubles from such a change will bother you all the greater.
 

sayak83

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
Thank you for sharing it, it was interesting and informative.

I really like your display picture of goddess Durga, she looks cute and adorable. Where was it taken?
Kolkata. My home town.
 
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