Part 2: Bhagavad Gita Chapter 7 - Lesson 6 of 8
When Kṛṣṇa says, 'He goes to the planets of the demigods,' don't think there is some planet out there! He talks about inner space and experience.
If we worship some god out of greed, we never come out of that greed. We will be continuously caught in greed. If we worship some god out of fear, we will be always in that fear. If we worship the Divine out of love and gratitude, we experience a totally different inner space, the space of completion, the space of Enlightenment.
He makes one more statement: madbhaktā yānti mām api—My devotees attain Me. Then He says these words:
If you approach Me with the ultimate attitude, with the attitude of love and gratitude, you achieve Me.
The greatest attitude is gratitude. If you approach Me with gratitude, you experience Me. 'Again and again people ask me, 'Swamiji, when I have so many problems, how can I be grateful?'
We continuously pray, 'Oh God, please give me a diamond ring.' Do we feel grateful that He gave us the finger to wear the ring?
We don't feel grateful that He gave us the finger. Be very clear, the finger is not our birthright. There are thousands of people who don't have hands. There are thousands who don't have a finger. It's not our birthright. We continuously pray intensely, in all possible ways, 'Oh God, give me this. Oh God, give me that.' But we never feel grateful for the things that are showered on us.
This very life is a blessing! Can we say that our life has been given to us as payment for some job that we did in Vaikuṇṭha (abode of Lord Viṣṇu) or Kailāśa (abode of Lord Śiva)? No! It's not as if we worked for 100 years in Kailāśa, and earned a check that says, 'Alright, have 70 years of life.' If we work in the army, they give us money to study. It's not like that; we did not get life as a salary. It's a pure blessing showered on us
Every breath is a blessing!
The breath that we inhale and exhale is a boon given to us. This very life is a blessing. Continuously we miss things that are not part of our possession.
But we never experience the things that are showered on us by the Divine. Each of us has a big list of things that God has not given us and we also have a big list of things that God has given us. If you take a paper and pen and start writing these lists, both lists will be endless. Every moment of our life is a gift from the Divine. We are alive, we are still conscious; that by itself is a gift from the Divine.
Help the children to understand the steps in our seeking. Bring the understanding that how we approach the Divine is important in our spiritual progress.
- Does Kṛṣṇa say there is a right way and a wrong way to approach him?
- What are the first four levels of a normal seeker?
- How are pūjā, japa, and jñāna described?
- What freedom does the Hindu tradition give you?
- What practice is the most powerful technique to put you in bhāva samādhi immediately?
- Do Hindus worship idols?
- What blessings has God given us?