MAYA AND ILLUSION – BY MR. RAGHAVENDRA SOMAYAJI A person said the entire Creation is an illusion, our lives are an illusion, our Sadhana is an illusion, even the Light that we channel and the Light Channelling process are all illusions. He also said that we are part of God, stuck in the illusion of separateness and that we don’t need to experience love or bliss because, we are love and bliss. He believes that only after experiencing Nirvikalpa Samadhi, we will be free from this illusion. Nirvikalpa Samadhi is a state in which we experience Oneness with God. Though what he says is partly true, some of these views are extreme. If he had been a student of this Path, I am sure he wouldn’t have had such extreme views. This idea of illusion is not something new. Both ancient and modern Spiritual Seekers have repeatedly said that the whole Creation is an illusion or Maya. Some Sadhaks even follow the severe method of punishing their bodies in order to free themselves from their attachment to the body, hoping that it will liberate them from the illusion. Maya is one of the many Spiritual Realities that has been misunderstood by many. The literal meaning of the Sanskrit word Maya is magic or illusion or non-reality. We have understood from Guruji that the Maya referred here is not illusion. We already know that the Unmanifested God came into existence as Divine Light, which later became Consciousness, the Divine Matter. God built the entire Creation using this Divine Matter. Since the whole Creation is constructed from Consciousness, which is made of Divine Light, the whole Creation is fundamentally made of Light. When a soul looks at the Creation, it sees only Light. It cannot perceive the diversity of the Creation. The infinite soul which is formless cannot perceive the finite boundaries of Creation. This is probably because, the soul can only perceive that which vibrates at its own frequency, which is that of Light. The manifested Creation vibrates at a different frequency. So, to help the souls to perceive the Creation, God gave each soul a special gadget or a faculty. When a soul looks through this gadget, it can see the diversity in Creation. This gadget is called Maya. Without this tool we can see only Light when we look at the Creation. An example of this is the state of Turiya. Turiya is a state that is reached when we go beyond Nirvikalpa Samadhi. Nirvikalpa Samadhi is a state in which the separation between the Soul and God disappears, and it usually occurs during Meditation. The state of Turiya is experienced all the time, not just during Meditation. Guruji had explained to us that in this state, the individual’s Awareness would have gone beyond the faculty of Maya, and therefore, he will see only Light. Guruji had said that a person in Turiya state will not be able to differentiate between the wall and the door. This does not mean that they cease to exist for him. It only means that the individual is not using the faculty of Maya and therefore, cannot perceive the dense matter. In such a state, it would be very difficult to live a normal life without the help and assistance from others. Because of this, Guruji had said that the Rishis do not allow a person to remain in this state for long. They quickly shift the person to the next stage called Turiyateeta, which means, ‘beyond Turiya’. This is a state in which a person is aware at both levels: the level of the Light and the level of Creation. In other words, the person can perceive both, the form and its essence, the formless behind all forms. He can see through the screen of Maya and he can also see beyond the Maya. The Creation is often described in Sanskrit as a Leela, which means a Cosmic Game played by God. He first creates the Cosmos. He then divides Himself into trillions of souls, enters the Creation and experiences it for billions of years. After that, He withdraws the Creation and all the souls go back Home, regardless of their Spiritual condition, regardless of how much Karmas they have accumulated. Every soul will attain Mukti regardless of what kind of life it has led during its stay in the Material Cosmos. After a few billion more years, God again begins manifesting the Creation. Because of this, the entire process is described as a Leela, a Divine Game played by God to experience and enjoy Himself. There are no losers in this Divine Game. Everybody wins because each soul would have some experience that it can take back and offer it to God. We are souls, we a re God Himself and we are here to play this Divine Game. We can play it well by participating in this game consciously. If we forget that this is God’s Leela, then it will not be a game anymore. Life will then be a very serious business, a heavy burden to carry or something to escape from. Coming back to the subject of Maya, there are two parts in this process of experiencing. The Creation itself, built out of Divine Matter, and its perception by us, the souls. Whenever I think about the workings of Maya, I am reminded of its similarity with the method that we use while watching a 3D movie. When we watch a 3D movie, we wear special glasses and see through them. Without these glasses, the image would be blurred. This is about the mechanism of Maya, the technical part. One may argue that the Creation exists only because we have the faculty, and that if we didn’t have the faculty, the world would not exist. This is similar to the proposition made by some philosophers that the world exists only when we look at it, and when we close our eyes, the world ceases to exist. We know that the world existed long before we came here. The world was made habitable by the efforts of countless Workers over billions of years. And yet, why do so many well-read people and other scholars and philosophers say that the Creation is nothing but an illusion? There is the second aspect of #Maya. To explain this, I will compare it to watching a movie. When we watch a movie, we are looking at a series of images displayed on a screen using some technology. We are well aware that the characters on the screen are only images and not real. Even the story of the movie could be based on a fiction. But in spite of knowing all this, we get so engrossed in watching a good movie that we even experience all the emotions. We may laugh, cry, get angry at the villains, feel the injustice done to some of the characters in the movie, and even seek punishment to the villains. If it is a really good movie, we may even feel expanded, manifest love and compassion, experience bliss, etc. We might even learn some Spiritual Truths from it. And when the movie ends, we return to our normal lives, having transformed a little, probably. The important point to note here is this. Even though the characters that we see in the movie are not real and the story is a fiction, the experiences that we have and the emotions that we go through while watching it are very real. So, it is the experience that is more important than the process involved behind the experience. One might experience anger or joy while watching it. The experience of these emotions is very real. Some movies carry such Divine messages that we may feel expanded and transformed after watching them. These effects are real. One can say that the movie is just an illusion, created using technology. But we have to realise that the experience of the movie is real. Comparing this to the Creation, one can say that the Creation is just an illusion created using Consciousness and Maya. The mechanism behind the Creation is not so important. It is the experience of the Creation which is of utmost importance. The intellectuals may go on arguing that the world is unreal, and they may even keep telling themselves all the time that what they see is not really there. If they do this, they will be denying life itself and thereby wasting the gift of life. I came across a short story, where a fake Sanyasi in the Himalayas will be sitting on a rock and preaching only one thing to anyone that came to him, which is, the whole world is false and only God is true. One of the followers who is not convinced, hires an elephant and commands it to chase this Sanyasi. Seeing this, the Sanyasi gets up and starts running. Then this follower asks him, “Why are you running? Isn’t the elephant an illusion?” For this, he says, “Even my running is an illusion.” This is living in denial based on intellectual knowledge and it does not help. So, seeing the whole Creation as an illusion is one extreme. The other extreme is, believing that the Creation is permanent and getting too involved in the minor details of life. To illustrate this, I will quote an anecdote that I read somewhere long ago. On a Sunday afternoon, a family of three generations, that includes the grandmother and the granddaughter, will be watching a movie that is full of tragedy. The heroine will be subject to a lot of mental torture and suffering, and most of the family members watching it will be in tears. After watching this for quite some time, the grandmother who is very involved in it exclaims, “O God! When will this suffering end?” To this the granddaughter immediately says, “By 2:30pm”, because she knows that’s when the movie ends. I see two important lessons in this. When we get too deeply involved in life and when life gets miserable, filled with agony and suffering, we have to remind ourselves of the Great Creator behind this Creation, and that we have come here to experience and enjoy His Creation. When we take life too seriously and forget the Creator behind it, we get disillusioned and we get lost in the Maya or Leela. We then try to escape from it rather than experience it. And when life gets too difficult, we have to remind ourselves of the temporariness of everything in Creation. The ancient adage, “This too shall pass” should remind us of the fleeting nature of everything in life. Some people make this into a kind of practice. Whenever they are going through difficulties or suffering, they repeat these words to themselves, “This too shall pass”. Even when we are going through good times and enjoying life, we have to say, “This too shall pass”, reminding ourselves that even the good things are temporary and that even as we enjoy them, we should not get attached to them. So, experiencing this Creation while not getting attached to it is the most important requirement for a peaceful life. When we get deeply attached to things in life, forgetting that they are temporary, and when we lose these things in the course of Time, we begin to feel miserable and miss the point of life. At such times, we have to remind ourselves that we are players in the Divine Game. There is an amazing book titled ‘A Course in Miracles’. The authors of this book say that its content was channelled to them by Christ. When we read it we can make out that the knowledge in it is not from an ordinary person. In the book’s introduction, there is a simple yet profound point, which I quote: “Nothing unreal exists.” Close quote. How true this is! How can anything that is unreal exist? How can God’s Creation be unreal? Everything that God creates is real. Other than that there is nothing else. So, God did not create an illusion to deceive us. Maya is a gift and an opportunity for us to experience the Creation and go beyond it, and have even higher experiences. Guruji had often said that living a balanced life is Spiritual, and that we should avoid extremes, walking the middle Path. As I said earlier, believing that the Creation is an illusion, or believing that it is the only reality are both extremes. The middle Path here is to be aware of the temporariness of the things in Creation while also experiencing and enjoying it, and not rejecting it as unreal. I am reminded of the famous experience of Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, where he looks at the birds flying in the sky and enters into a state of Samadhi. Though the birds are a part of the so called “illusion”, he could see the Divine in their beauty and enter into Samadhi. Similarly, when Guruji saw a butterfly, he experienced the Divinity behind its beauty and entered into a state of expansion and Samadhi. This is the ultimate purpose of form, which is, to help us go beyond it and experience the formless. So, while we remain unattached to the form, we must become aware of the formless behind the form. This is the purpose of beauty in Creation, which is, to remind us of the Formless Divine behind all forms. So, when we try to live this life fully, we must try to be aware of the permanent Divinity behind the temporary forms. If we can practise this, we will not get attached to the forms and play the Divine Game well. In other words, we will be living a Spiritual life. I recently watched a video of a seventeen year old girl talking about her life. This girl suffers from a serious lung disease, which has affected 80% of her lungs. She can use only the remaining 20% of her lungs to breathe. This means, every single breath she takes is a struggle. She cannot engage in most of the normal activities and she has to be mostly bed ridden. Very frequently there will be emergencies and she has to be rushed to the hospital. Living such a life, one day she realised that she can choose to be happy regardless of her situation. She realised that happiness is an attitude and has decided to be happy. What I noticed is that this girl, who has very few moments each day to live the way she wants, has realised that we must live this life fully. And she lives life fully as much as practically possible. She is an artist and enjoys painting. At such a young age, she has learnt many Spiritual lessons by observing the life around. Comparing her life to others who are in a far worse condition, she says she is thankful and grateful for her life. This seventeen year old says happiness can only come through acceptance. And she says she accepts her life situation and that she is grateful to God for this wonderful gift of life. Life is not an illusion for her. It is very real. This is how this Creation provides us the opportunities to experience gratitude, kindness and compassion, peace, love, joy, beauty, faith, acceptance and surrender. Without the Creation it would not be possible to experience any of these. If we conclude and declare that this world is just an illusion, we miss all this and lose the opportunity. The #Creation with its Divine Cosmoses, the Material #Cosmos and its galaxies, all the dimensions, art, music, beauty, etc. are there just to enable the human experience. All the Rishis, the #Divine Personalities and the countless #Astral Workers and many others are working so hard to help us have these experiences. We only need to open our eyes and see the reality in all its glory.
Posted on: Mon, 17 Mar 2014 09:51:29 +0000
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