Loosen the Bundle

Sri Siddharameshwar Maharaj

When the state of Self-Knowledge is attained, your own dinner is an offering to God, your walking is making sacred rounds (pradakshina) around God's image. To speak is to praise Him, and to sleep is his samadhi. To be seated in a casual repose, is his unbroken samadhi. To 'be' naturally, to 'exist', is Brahman that has become manifest. That is Brahman in human form, which has become visible. There is nothing else except 'It'. That is how it is said that the saints are Brahman expressed in manifest form. The bundle exists because you have tied it. We have to loosen this bundle by thinking, then there will be no bundle. The lack of discrimination is the separateness that is the bundle, the Jiva. When the lack of discrimination is gone, there is no duality. Then there is only Brahman. The bundle was put together by accumulating various things. While analyzing and sifting these things, the bundle does not remain. The one who was carrying the load of bundle becomes stripped of attributes.

When "I" has gone, who is there to any spiritual practice (sadhana)? Who will do meditation? The greatness of the Saints is that they have given the blessings for me to say that I myself am God. It is very difficult for others to accept the salutations of a person of "Real Knowledge". He is God in person, the Almighty. It is extraordinarily hard to be the recipients of salutations from Him. The sin or merit, heaven and hell, do not effect Him. He is self-evident. He is undivided and unhindered in His straightness. He does not suffer Saturn's bad period. Even the sin of one who remembers the "Knowledgeable One" (jnani) is wiped clean. By His touch, a person goes beyond birth and death. God says, "My presence, looking upon me, is itself good deed, and auspicious time." The jnani, does not suffer defamation because he is not an individual. He is unexpressed, and beyond all qualities and all forms. Yogis and munis had in them a sense of pride of their being yogis (performers of various austerities and yoga postures, or vows of silence). Lord Krishna also told them that their status was very high because they were not able to lose their identification with their physical body. They were proudly showing off their hair and beards. He said, "You may have a lifetime of billions of years." They had strange notions of sins in eating and drinking. Lord Krishna, however, remained pure, even though doing all sorts of things, because He was aware of Himself as the highest Paramatman.

One who breaks the ties of the body will be Paramatman and the life is fulfilled. You should continue on with your contemplation. Do not hold to any concepts. Do not simply believe in the concept that if Brahman is everywhere, I will be saved. Even when all of this is Brahman, do not hold onto any concepts. Brahman is without concepts. With this "understanding", you will be liberated. Those who harbor doubts fail. Those who are the devotees of the Guru attain the state of Brahman. First, you have to listen to spiritual sermons, then comes service to the Guru, then comes Self-Realization, and then the attainment of the state of Brahman. Those who are simple souls are the ones who have unshakable faith and trust. When you surrender yourself, the only pure thing that remains is Brahman. Do not allow the demon of ego which is hell.