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certainly do it. To resolve firmly is egoism. What cannot be
achieved through egoism? One day the saint Sahajanand Swami
met a King, in the province of Kathiawad. The king told
Sahajanand Swami that a very impressive ascetic had come to
town. This ascetic had remained buried underground for two
weeks. Swami told the king to make the ascetic repeat this feat
in his presence. The ascetic, through his ego remained buried
underground for fifteen days. At the time of his surfacing, Swami
told the King not to send a large procession to greet the ascetic
as he had previously done, but instead send just two policemen.
When the ascetic surfaced and did not see anyone waiting to
greet him, he became enraged and began to shout, “Where is
the King? Where is the horse carriage? Where is the band? He
collapsed while shouting and died. He lived through his ego and
when that ego was not nourished, he died. The definition of ego
is to impose yourself where you are not.
In reality ‘you’ the Self does not die. It is the ego that
dies and takes birth again. Death does not occur until the ego
endorses it, and the foolish do not refrain from endorsing it.
When a person is bed-ridden and suffering with pain, he
endorsees his death by saying it would be better to die than go
through the suffering. Here the endorsement becomes inevitable.
Who Is The Enjoyer?
The Self does not enjoy anything. It cannot enjoy anything.
If it were the intrinsic nature of the Self to enjoy, then that
tendency would always remain with the Self and liberation would
never be achieved. The one who enjoys is merely using his ego
when saying ‘I enjoyed it’. Senses are effective. Because of
causes, the senses become effective. As effects unfold, because
of illusion, you egotistically claim to be the doer or the enjoyer.
When this illusion of ‘I am the doer’ is removed and you
understand who the real doer is, liberation is at hand. It is