Continued from above.......

So we have to sort what is really ananda and what is sukha because right now we mistake one for the other, and that disqualifies us from a full discussion about this.

Marcia Beloved 3 years ago

I had an experience years ago during sleep which seems to apply to this discussion.   I was living in a rural area of Guyana, South America at the time, in MiBeloved's home country.  I had had trouble falling asleep that evening, tossing and turning and turning for several hours before finally drifting off to sleep. The air was probably hot and dense.  It was after 2 am when during sleep, I found myself in the midst of a golden energy.  I was not a body or anything.  It was not a dream either.  My consciousness was in the midst of and surrounded by limitless vibrant, golden particles.  It was total equilibrium. The particles appeared the same to me, and were stationary and vibrating ever so slightly at a constant rate.  I was there for about 8 to 10 seconds and then, remaining as consciousness, I traveled through a dark expanse of space for some time, and then heard a slight clicking sound every few second shortly before waking up.

I did not feel excited until I was back in the physical body and awake.  Then I was happy, I was excited, my mind was racing and thinking, "I was in the gold!  I was in the gold!"   And that was how I described it to Michael the next morning, "I was in the gold!" 

In this case, the actual experience may likely qualify as a type of ananda. I was blissful and balanced but at the same time in total stability.   When I woke up in the body, I hooked back up to the sense of identity, the buddhi and all the sensual equipments and then became happy and excited.  The stable, steady, blissful, almost boring if referenced to material life, energy could not be carried over into my bodily existence.

During spiritual practice and when experiences come of their own accord, as this one did, one needs to pay attention and notice when you are in a state where the total material body and adjuncts are left behind.  This is when the spirit or core self experiences total separation from the material identity.

I'm thinking that the isolated spirit is the experiencer of ananda.  When the spirit retains any degree of identification to the material identity, one may experience bliss tinged with material happiness, which is sukha. 

The value of sukha is not to be minimized, because it is a useful propelling energy as one transitions out of material identification and enters samadhi and ananda states of spiritual isolation.

MiBeloved 3 years ago

Rupalkumar wrote:

Thanks, now I can understand that one cannot really become master of sat-chit-anand as he is the form of the same created by eternal entity/energy, he should try to realize that. It's a different journey for different souls, some for long and some for short, but we have to as this is the basic form of all of us which is presently coated with "maya" or "material world".

Michealji, theoretically understanding is possible for me but implementation and getting the confidence as I am on a right path is difficult. Sometimes sub-conscience replies but we can force it, and if we do so, it will not support us, so how do we know that we are doing right or wrong at every moment, if we consider the audit of "karma" at every moment. Pl. explain.

MiBeloved's Response:

There is no possibility of getting back into satchidananda by performing karmic activities in this world, and that means good, bad or neutral karmic activities. The karmic way is like when a race car driver is on a circular track. Some drivers have mastered the art of racing and so they get around the track at the fastest speed. They also use the most efficient engines.

Other riders are sloppy going around the steep curves and crash their cars frequently. They become hurt, take some months in a clinic to get medically repaired and then they return to the track to compete again.

Some other drivers drive with care but due to this they never win any races because they are not able to compete with the good or bad desperadoes.

But in all cases, none of the karmic drivers are able to get off the track because it is a circular route which always leads back to the way of the asphalt. If we read the fine print about karma yoga in the Vedic literature, we will discover that it was exclusive for Ksatriya kings. But even they had to close it off near the end of life, after giving over the royal responsibilities of governing to their sons. Then these Ksatriyas went to the forest for end of life austerities.

Check the Mahabharata and find out how the Pandavas even, had to do it. At a certain point even the most proficient karma yogi has to close off the beneficial social activities to focus fully on spiritual transfer (moksha).

The audit of karma, any which way, either as a social criminal or as a social benefactor leads back into the material world either to be a better more efficient criminal or a better more efficient do-gooder. It always leads back into the material world. Ultimately it is designed only to match up the expectation of the Universal Form of Sri Krishna in so far as he has some interest in managing the human behavior.

But this does not mean that the influence of karma yoga can be converted into spiritual development. The face of Krishna which is turned to the material world is not the same face of Krishna which is in the spiritual world.

The account for relocating to the spiritual world is a totally different account. Krishna looking at the gopis and Krishna looking at the wretched acts of the Kauravas, in molesting the chaste woman Draupadi, are two different and totally separate features of the God.

Krishna playing with the gopas and Krishna playing with the warriors at Kurukshetra are two different kinds of play, like when a cat plays with its kittens and when the same cat plays with a bird which it caught.

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What is my interest?

Do I want to serve God in the material world, as a righteous king doing karma yoga?

Or do I want to serve God in the spiritual world, as a friend, son or servant of God?

These paths do not cross and are not confused except in the mind of the devotees who cannot sort the situation of the material world and that of the spiritual places.

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Karma yoga has to do with social life in this world. It is not connected to existence in the spiritual world. There is no need for karma yoga in the spiritual setting. It is totally non-existent there.