Transcriptions
Dev Priyānanda Svāmī Bhagavān
Video Link: YouTube
So, let’s begin. So, the other day I was talking about my recent realizations, and Shashank is asking, what is the experience of being in the point of view of Brahman? What is that like?
I can’t share the experience directly, unfortunately, so I have to talk about what it’s like. So to answer this, I have to go back to an experience that I had back in 1985 or so.
I was on the island of Guam in the South Pacific. Guam is sort of directly south of Japan and east of the Philippines, to give you an idea where it is. It’s just a tiny speck of land out in the middle of nowhere, and I like—when I go to Guam or any island, you know, every island has a front side and a back side, sort of like the front door and the back door. And so all the ‘civilized’ people, you know, are on the front side, and all the wild people are on the back side.
So I used to hang out on the back side by a place called Cocos Island. And there’s a beautiful lagoon there, a huge lagoon. It’s like two miles wide by five miles long or something, and there’s millions and zillions of fish. I used to go free-diving there all the time.
So one day I was walking along the beach on the way back from diving, and I had been meditating on the idea, well, what does God see? What does the world look like from God’s point of view? So I had been meditating on this for several days. And I was thinking about it as I was walking along the beach road. And I lifted up my foot to take a step.
And suddenly I wasn’t on the beach road anymore. I was in a huge hand; picked up by this enormous hand. And I was like the size of a tiny ant, this hand, and the hand is going up, accelerating up more and more. And so I was like dizzy, you know, because of the movement, the motion, and I didn’t dare get near the edge. But it was going up and up and up and up. Well, finally, it slowed down and stopped.
And so I very carefully crawled over to the edge and looked over to see where we were. And we were hundreds of miles high above the earth. And it wasn’t the earth, because even though there was an ocean, just like the ocean I had just left, this ocean went off into unlimited distance. There was no horizon. There was no end to it. It just kept going and going.
It was really, really weird. And there were all these waves in the ocean, right? And they’re breaking against the shore, a beach. And the beach is also going in both directions forever.
So then I heard this voice say, “Every drop in this ocean is a living being like you. And every grain of sand on that beach is a world.”
So I was like, whoa, you know. And then, slowly, this hand began to turn until I wasn’t facing out over the ocean anymore. I was facing back toward the face of the huge being that owned that hand.
And what did I see? Well, it’s pretty hard to describe, but it was like a light, a light that was so pure and bright, yet it was soft and transparent. And it’s just hard to describe.
Any of you who’ve taken acid, a lot of acid, you know about the clear light. Well, this was the source of the clear light. So when I saw this, I was like, “Wow, this is like the ultimate. I can’t believe this.”
I’m trying to fix the focus here. And it was so beautiful. It was so attractive. I felt myself drawn to it. This light seemed to have no source or center, yet it was all-pervading.
I mean, it was really hard to describe. And so beautiful that I just felt myself drawn to it and like dissolving into it. So I pulled myself back. I said, “No, I can’t dissolve!” This was before I had studied Advaita and all this, you know. So I was a little afraid of it.
So I pulled myself back, and I looked at the place where I was at, and suddenly I was back on the ocean. I was back on the road, and the foot that I had lifted when this whole thing started came down, boom.
In other words, the whole experience took less than a second. But for me, it was like 15 minutes. It was deep. It was powerful. It was divine. You know, it was everything.
So now, I find myself in the center of that light. That’s the only way I can describe it. It’s like whatever I saw in that vision so many years ago, 1985. What’s that, 30, 35 years ago? Holy cow. That is where I am now. And yeah, I did dissolve. So let me see if I can tell any more about what it’s like.
Well, I feel very light, you know. I mean, this body is kind of heavy by its nature. I have a kapha body. So I have heavy bones, heavy limbs and muscles. But I feel light. I feel like a child, a kid.
I feel full of energy, full of happiness, full of enthusiasm for whatever it is I’ve got to do here in the last few years of my presence on this planet. I feel like everything that is, is part of one thing, and that includes me. I don’t feel like I’m the center of it or the origin of it, yet I notice that as I change my consciousness, my world changes too.
But this could just be an artifact of perception. The main thing is everything is so beautiful; just the light, the morning light coming through the trees and the leaves dancing in the wind, and the little birds flying here and there. I always leave food out for them. They come and then take the food and water. Sometimes they jump in the water and take their bath. It’s just so beautiful.
It’s hard to describe. It’s like being a kid again. It’s like being reborn, but it’s being reborn in a completely different way. I don’t feel like I am my body. I feel like if I am anything, it’s my consciousness. I also feel like, you know, those TARDIS things in Doctor Who, it looks like a phone booth, but then you go in and it’s actually like a whole house.
My head is like that. You think it looks about the size of a football, right? But inside it’s vast. It’s huge. It’s unlimited. So you know, I don’t know how to describe this. There aren’t words for it, unfortunately. People who made our language usually weren’t concerned about such things, I guess. But I guess if I was to look up in the scriptures, I could find some words for it.
But really, what I’m trying to get you to do is to have this experience for yourself, to approach this Brahman. And the easiest way to approach Brahman is through the Goddess, through Śakti, because She is the incarnation of compassion. It’s stated in the second śloka of the praises of Her; you know, in the beginning of the Thousand Names of the Goddess, in the second śloka of the dhyāna-śloka, it’s called, that compassion flows from Her eyes like waves, just like the waves of the ocean.
I don’t know, we got on an ocean thing today. So like the waves of the ocean, you know, they go all day and night, unstoppable. And just constant motion and constant flux, constant movement of energy. That’s Her compassion. That’s what it’s like. So by taking, you know, surfing on these waves of compassion, we very easily can reach to the goal of Self-realization.
And that’s why, you know, our whole course site and everything that we’re working on is going to be themed around Her, you know, around the seven cakras and the catur-darśanam, the four stages of Self-realization, the four views of the world according to our state of consciousness. And it’s going to guide you step-by-step through these levels. And the idea is, of course, that you can realize them too.
So there’s nothing holding you back except your misconceptions, your fixed ideas, your actually wrong views of reality. That’s the only thing that’s keeping you from realizing this Brahman, this unlimited awareness of awareness, which is the source of everything, sat-cit-ānanda: being, consciousness and bliss.
ĀŪṀ Tat Sat. ĀŪṀ Śakti ĀŪṀ.