- Talk-Think-Shishir Ramavat

- Until we look at any horror story in the light of soul, nature and ego, we will not be able to reach its essence and will be stuck in mere gross descriptions or incidents.

How much truth and how much exaggeration is there in 'The Kerala Story', how much benefit or loss will this film bring to any political party? Whether this film has started any other discussion or not, but from the way the audience coming out of the theater after the end of the show, eagerly giving video bites in response to 'Film kaisi lagi? That a man who calls himself a Hindu has suddenly realized that he has barely any gross knowledge about his religion. Parents do not impart religious knowledge to their children and because of this children remain under-confident about religion. When youths are asked questions related to gods and goddesses, they have no answers and are put in a distressing position...

good. It is good if the conviction that he (or his children) knows only superficially about religion is slapped on the cheek. Now two roads open ahead. One way is to become fanatical about one's religion, to follow one's customs-festivals-beliefs very aggressively. Another way is to develop a deep and true understanding of the basic tenets of Hinduism or Sanatan Dharma, to understand the subtle meaning behind various rituals, actions and symbols instead of getting hung up on gross customs and external behaviours, and not towards religious spectacle. But to turn to true spirituality. We have to take another way out of these two.

We know the story of Ramayana and Mahabharata. We are familiar with the stories of some gods and goddesses. Many of us know how to chant Hanuman Chalisa loudly from childhood... All this is auspicious, desirable, praiseworthy, but let's not be satisfied with this. We have to understand the meaning behind the stories, know the meaning of symbols and nouns. Many of our religious gurus and spiritual thinkers are doing this very well. We have to cultivate not only reverence towards them, but discipleship.

Ramayana and Mahabharata are full of very juicy and exciting events. One of the main purposes behind which the authors have made these texts juicy and exciting is to draw us closer to these texts. We all know the story of Krishna birth. Sri Sri Ravi Shankar reveals the spiritual meaning of this story in this way, 'Devaki who gave birth to Krishna is a symbol of the gross body, Krishna's father Vasudeva is a symbol of Prana. When Prana manifests in the body, Ananda or Krishna is born. Krishna is the symbol of supreme bliss. (Krishna means Param Atma or Supreme Soul. You can also call him the purest form of love.) Similarly, Kansa is the symbol of ego. Kansa being the brother of Devaki means that the ego is born along with the body. The most opposed to ego, soul and love. When pure love confronts the ego, the ego does not survive. It has to dissolve. Freshly born Krishna was the source of supreme bliss, ease and love. The story says that mother Devaki was in prison when Krishna was born. What does this mean? As long as Krishna's consciousness is not manifested in life, this body remains like a prison...'

While celebrating Krishna's birth i.e. Janmashtami, one should recite these things in mind. Where did gambling on Janmashtami come into this? We have people sitting there waiting for Janmashtami to gamble. What is the relationship between gambling and devotion to Krishna? Krishna who saved Draupadi from the gamblers in the Dyutasabha by giving him a wo should gamble on his birthday? is awesome Who knows how such evils are ingrained in the society. Just for fun let's play a little innocent gambling between varas, but please don't associate this activity with Krsna (Param Satya, Parabrahm).

There is no dearth of fools who view the rasalila of Krishna and the Gopis in terms of lust. As Krishna lovers, we should know the story with the correct context when such accusations are made against Krishna. The whole story is something like that Kamadeva made a bet against Krishna that on the night of Poonma in the month of Aso, you have to come to the forest of Vrindavan with the gopis who are more beautiful than the nymphs. Kamadeva's intention was that this environment and conditions would be so favorable that Krishna's mind could easily be created with desire. Krishna accepted the challenge. On the night of Poonma in the forest of Vrindavan, he played the tune of the flute and the gopis ran to Krishna forgetting their sanity. There was no fear in the minds of the gopis, as they knew that they were not doing anything wrong by playing rasa with Krishna. The gopis were odorless. To play Rasa with Krishna is to attain the Supreme. Krishna understood the mood of the gopis. Delighted, he took many forms and started performing rasa with each gopi. Kamadeva exerted all his might, but he could not even for a moment arouse lust within Krishna, who was playing maharasa with the gopis, who were more charming than the nymphs. Thus, Krishna also kept all the gopis close to him, created the maharas and also won the bet of Kamadeva.

The gopis were so fortunate that they got the chance to play rasa with the saguna (physical) form of Krishna. As the saints say, even in Kali Yuga one can form a spiritual relationship with God through devotion and meditation. This is a rasa beyond body and mind. Asho sees Rasa as a meeting of opposing forces. They say, 'Here Krishna dances like the male element (Purusha means soul). The Gopis dance not as Prakriti, but as Prakriti. Thus, the dance of soul and nature is Rasa.'

Unless we look at any horror story in the light of soul, nature and ego, we will not be able to reach its essence and will be stuck in mere gross descriptions or incidents.

Even Navratri is celebrated with great fanfare, but we stay away from its mystical meaning. We know that Maa Durga killed demons, but what does this have to do with our day-to-day lives? Rakshasa means which demon? For the answer to all these questions we have to go to the book 'Sri Durgasaptashati'. This book explains to us that there are three types of Rakshasa and they are sitting inside us - hypocrisy, infatuation and infatuation. The goddess who destroys these three demons represents the three Gunas - Tamoguni Mahakali, Rajoguni Mahalakshmi and Satoguni Mahasaraswati. Until we have this kind of conceptual clarity, we are stuck on the surface and when someone pesters us about Navratri or Mehena, we have no response other than superficial details of events.

Ignorantly someone asks that your God is crying, how can he protect others if he himself is weak? Our spiritual scholars have already given an answer to this that avatars like Rama, Krishna, Shiva have been deliberately made to look human. Our venerable characters cry, suffer, fall in love, get angry, make mistakes like normal human beings. Human flaws are deliberately kept in avatars so that we feel like ourselves, inspired by seeing them, that if they were able to live a very high standard of life, achieve great achievements, despite having the same qualities and limitations as we do. But through determination and adventure we can live a higher life, move towards self-knowledge and liberation.

One thing out of a hundred. It is easy to become stubborn or aggressive. Instead of taking that path, let us understand the essence of our scriptures, cultivate the vision to see beyond gross customs and symbols, seek spiritual understanding by going to books, and move towards self-enlightenment through excellent listening-association. This is the right way to protect religion.