Aptavani-2
15
absolute Self (parmatma) here.
How can you do purusharth (true inner endeavor)
without becoming a purush (the Self)?
A prominent professor once came to me. He harbored
the notion ‘I know something’ and ‘I am doing some purusharth.’
‘We’ asked him, “What do you do? What is your purusharth?”
and he replied, “All my efforts are solely for the soul.” ‘We’
asked him, “How can you do purusharth without becoming a
purush? You dance according to the tunes of your relative self
(prakruti) and you say, ‘I danced’.”
‘We’ challenge anyone in this entire world that whatever
he is doing, it is not under his own independent power. Arey!
Even when you go to the toilet to evacuate your bowels, it is not
your own independent doing. Some 250 very prominent doctors
came to satsang in Baroda and ‘We’ asked them, “You claim to
treat your patients who are constipated, but do you think it is
under your control to evacuate their bowels?” They all claimed,
“But indeed we are the ones who help them go to the toilet.”
‘We’ asked them, “When you do not have independent control
over your own bowel movements, how can you have control
over someone else’s? You will realize this when you become
constipated yourself, you will discover that it is not under your
independent control. The prakruti makes one do everything but
the ego within says, ‘I did it’.”
That which increases the keyf (intoxicate the
ego) is relative knowledge
The knowledge of all prominent scholars, of those who
have studied the scriptures extensively, the knowledge of
prominent sages, preceptors and spiritual teachers is all worldly
knowledge; it is relative knowledge (prakrutgnan). The
difference between prakrutgnan and atmagnan (knowledge of
the Self, real knowledge) is like the difference between milk and
buttermilk. How does relative knowledge work? It uses prakruti