Adhvaitha: Decoding Reality

Speaker A [00:00:00]:

Do we control our destinies, or is our destiny predetermined? This is a question that will come to each one of us at some point in time during our lives. Do we actually have any control over our lives, and do we control the situations and things that we do in life or is everything predetermined, and is everything fixed in our lives? This is an important question for each and every one of us. So let us find an answer to this. Now this is a very tricky question, and the answer to this is not straightforward, and I myself have had this question for a very long time. Now before we go ahead with this topic, first, we need to understand the concept of karma because the concept of destiny is very much linked with karma. Karma is a concept which is talked about in the eastern twin teachings in Vedanta and in various instances of Vedas and Upanishads, karma is a concept that is elaborately described. So let us understand karma. Karma in Sanskrit means action.

Speaker A [00:01:19]:

So every kind of action that you perform is karma. The physical action that you do through your body, the mental action that you do through your thoughts, feelings, and emotions, and energy action that happens at a subtle level. All of these constitute karma. So let us talk about what exactly karma is and how does it work. Now, basically, you have a mind, and the nature of your mind is that it remembers every action it performs and every impression that it takes in, and your mind has various levels to it. You're only familiar with the surface level of mind, which is your conscious mind, and there are different deep levels to your mind. There is subconscious mind, there is something called as the unconscious mind, and there are various layers to your mind. Now what happens is whenever you perform an action or you think a thought or you feel a feeling, there is a subtle residue of that action that goes into your mind, and it is impressed at the deepest levels of the mind.

Speaker A [00:02:34]:

And in this way, your mind remembers everything. Your mind in itself has the evolutionary memory from when it was a plant and an animal and then an ape. And also as per the teachings of Hinduism, we live different lives as different people. We are all familiar with the concept of rebirths and incarnation, which sees that this mind goes through various cycles of life and death. We are born and reborn again and again in different physical bodies, and whatever actions that we perform during those lives is also impressed upon the mind at the deepest level. Now within this karma, there is something called as the sanchita karma, prarabdha karma, and agami karma. So we will make a future episode talking just about karma. But for the sake of this video, we will keep it simple.

Speaker A [00:03:29]:

Basically every impression that you have taken from all of your lifetimes is all present right here, right now, and it is at a deep level, and it has formed a karmic memory, which lies deep within your unconscious mind, this memory is responsible for the way you are right now and this memory that you have within your system has resulted in a certain kind of a personality which you have right now. Your personality is nothing but your thoughts, feelings, emotions, and your belief systems. So all of these things constitute your personality, and your personality is a result of your past karmic memory. Because of your personality, you behave in a certain way. You take different kinds of actions, and all of these things bring a certain kind of results in your life. And this is how your life has been going on. So the way you are right now is because of the karmic memory that you have, and the personality that you have right now is because of your karmic memory. And because of your personality, you take certain actions, and you respond to life in a certain way because of which you create certain results in your life in terms of your health, relationships, money, etcetera.

Speaker A [00:04:57]:

So based on your karma, the destiny for your life is fixed. But this is just one part of the answer. The next part is interesting. Now we are familiar with the western teachings of, positive psychology, law of attraction, manifestation, etcetera. But what the western teachings miss is the concept and the teaching of karma because karma is extremely important when we talk about destiny. To answer the question whether our life is predetermined or whether we have control over our lives. The answer is both, we can take the control of our lives. At the same time, the destiny for our life is fixed.

Speaker A [00:05:49]:

If you're wondering how can it be possible, let us now go deep into this subject. What we need to understand here is that our personality creates our personal reality. The way we think, the way we are, and the various feelings that we experience and go through every single day are creating and manifesting different situations and events in our lives, and our personalities are responsible for the lives that we live. Now let us take an example. You are sailing the boat. Now the water currents that are in the river have a certain momentum, and they push the boat in a certain direction, and the winds also push the boat in a certain direction. Pressure that is caused because of the water currents and because of the wind will sway your boat in a certain direction. But since you are holding the steering, if you hold it tight and if you steer it in the right direction, even though the boat wobbles a little bit here and there, it will eventually reach the right destination.

Speaker A [00:06:57]:

But what happens if you let go of the steering? What happens if you just let go and simply sit on the boat? The boat will then end up wherever the currents take it. It might go to a place that you wanted to go or it might go to a place that you didn't want it to go or it can go anywhere, wherever the wind and the currents take it. So this is exactly how we need to understand destiny. If we take charge of our lives, if we become conscious of our personalities, and if we start to live consciously, only then we have control over our destinies. But if we let go and if we live our lives unconsciously, like most of the people in this planet, we will not have any control over our lives, and our karmic memory and our karma, which has given rise to this current personality that we have will take us in a predetermined direction to a predetermined destination. If we do not want that to happen, we need to take charge of our lives. We need to be conscious of the way we think, about the way we feel and about our belief systems that we hold at the deepest levels. The good news is our personalities are malleable.

Speaker A [00:08:18]:

If you think about your own life, your personality, the way you are right now is probably different from the way you were a decade back. A lot of things would have changed. You would have had different belief systems then. You would have the different belief system now, and you will have different belief systems in the future. Now whether you're conscious about your personality and whether you are consciously thing, the right kind of personality is the important question. We need to, first of all, take an account of our personality the way it is right now, we need to make note of the positive things and the negative things. We need to look at the positive belief systems that we have and the negative belief systems that we have. And then we need to determine where we want to go in life.

Speaker A [00:09:08]:

We need to go deep and contemplate and come up with a purpose for our lives, which helps ourselves, our family and the society as a whole, and we need to see whether the personality that we have right now is compatible to handle that goal and to take us there. If not, we can go about to change this personality. And, of course, there are various methods types and techniques that we can use to do it, which we will discuss in the future episodes, but first of all, we need to be conscious of our personalities. Only then we can change the personality that we have in a way that it is compatible with our goals that we have for our lives. And by doing so, we can take charge of our lives, and we can become the master of our destiny. I hope this was valuable to you. If you find concepts like this useful, and if you want to learn more about creating your life consciously the way you want by using different methods and tools in order to do that, then we have created a special program, and we call it the conscious creation program. Ramp.

Speaker A [00:10:19]:

If you're interested in this, you can find the details at advaita.com. That is athbaitha. Com. Thank you, and I'll see you on the next one.

Speaker A [00:00:00]:

What is Advaita Vedanta? Advaita is the most fascinating philosophy which talks about the nature of reality and the nature of this universe. As I was searching for different teachings and different philosophies to find out the answers to the questions that I had, I came upon the ancient Upanishads, which talks about the nature of reality, and Advaita Vedanta is the most direct and the most clear interpretation of the Upanishads. Advaita literally translates to non dualism, and Advaita Vedanta simply tells us that the universe that we see all around us, the way we perceive it right now is an illusion. It is false. It is Maya, and it sees that there is no duality in this world. The duality that we experience is because of our minds, and it is because of a false identity that we have created for ourselves. But if we go beyond our mind And if we clearly see the reality for what it is, we cannot see duality, says Advaita. Now what does it mean, and how can we understand this? For someone who is new to this, it is very difficult, and it seems very complicated, and I get it.

Speaker A [00:01:21]:

But Advaita Vedanta is actually pretty simple, but it requires a lot of focus and an open mind to understand this knowledge. So in this episode, let us understand the true meaning of Advaita Vedanta. Now I will try to explain this through different examples so that it'll be easy to understand. Imagine this, a person is wearing his glasses, and these glasses are made of red colored lens. And because of the red lens, he is seeing this universe in a certain way. Wherever he goes, he is seeing the red sky. He's seeing the red cars, red trees, etcetera. Now this is not because the trees and sky all around him is actually red in color.

Speaker A [00:02:06]:

It is because of his lens, he is perceiving this reality in a certain way. Now what we need to understand as per Advaita is that The universe all around us is in a certain way. It is non dual. There is no duality. There is one pure consciousness everywhere, but your mind itself is a filter. It is a lens, just like in the example. Now because of The nature of your mind, you are perceiving this reality in a certain way, and you're perceiving this Body and mind to be you, and you are perceiving different objects outside of you as something apart from you, but all of this is because of your mind filter or because of your mind lens. Now if that person removes his lens, he will see the reality for what it is.

Speaker A [00:03:00]:

He will see a clear blue sky. He will see colorful birds, etcetera. Just like that, if we go beyond our minds, we will see reality for what it is as one pure consciousness. This is what we need to understand. Now our minds are a filter, and the parameters of this filter are time, space, and causation. Time, space, and causation are the boundaries of our minds, and our mind can never go beyond this boundary. And we see through the filter of time, space, and causation. So we can never understand something which is beyond time, which is beyond space, and which is beyond causation.

Speaker A [00:03:41]:

We cannot even think about something which was there before time, because even the word before will not make any sense in that context. And we can never think about an object which is beyond space that is impossible for our minds to understand. At the same time, we cannot understand and conceive something which is beyond causation. Causation is simply the concept of cause and effect. Within this universe, there is a cause for every effect, and there is an effect for every cause. For example, the day and night happens on earth because of the rotation of earth, different seasons happen because of the revolution of earth around the sun, etcetera. So like this, there are different effects for the cause, but we can never understand with our tiny little minds something coming into being without a cause. We cannot understand or fathom this universe coming into existence without a cause.

Speaker A [00:04:37]:

We cannot go beyond causation. These three aspects of time, space, and causation are the boundaries of human mind. And if we go beyond the mind, then we will See the reality for what it is. Such people are said to be enlightened or liberated. So the people who go beyond their minds can see this universe as it actually is. The way we are seeing right now is an absolute illusion which is created because of the nature of our minds. This is the essential teachings of Vedanta, and this is the core teaching of Advaita, which is nondualism. Now after this, you might be wondering how can all this Be non dual.

Speaker A [00:05:22]:

Of course, there is separation and duality in this world. I experience myself to be someone else. I see Different objects, which are outside of me. I see different animals. I play with different objects. All of these things are outside of me. How can all these things be 1, or how can there be no duality in this world? Because duality is what we see all around us. We see so many different things and so much of variety around us.

Speaker A [00:05:53]:

Our minds can never come to understand nondualism or Advaita. So for this, let us look at an example. This example will give you so much clarity on the subject of non dualism and Advaita, and this is one of my favorite examples to understand the nature of reality. Now imagine this. You have slept and you have gone into a dream. Now you have entered a dream world, And within your dream, you are your dream ego. You are someone else. Your height is different, and physically, the way you look may be different.

Speaker A [00:06:33]:

The way you are behaving there might be different, and along with that, you are having different experiences within your dream. Within your dream, you are walking around with your friends. You're talking to different people. You're, driving a car. You're looking at the Sky, you're singing, you're dancing, you're playing, and you're doing various different things within your dream. And within your dream are Also different people who come to you, who talk to you, who look like they're independent and who are apart from you, and you interact with them, and you interact with the world around you within your dream. And it will all seem like it is a reality to you. Let's say in the dream, you wander off to a forest and you saw a tiger there.

Speaker A [00:07:25]:

Immediately, you're scared because within the dream, you do not know that it is something which is unreal. You feel it to be real, and you're scared, and you try to run and you try to escape. Now it is only after You wake up from that dream that you realize that whatever you experienced within the dream was not real. The tiger and your friends and your family and the different experiences that you had within the dream We're not real, and when I say they were not real, I don't mean that they didn't happen. Of course, at that point of time within the dream, you Experienced all those things. In that sense, it was real to you. But then once you wake up, we call it unreal because Whatever happened in your dream has no effect on you whatsoever. It does not matter if you were a millionaire within the dream because once you wake up, whatever you had is not carried over to you.

Speaker A [00:08:25]:

And whatever pain or suffering that you had within your dream has no effect on you once you wake up. That is why you do not feel that whatever happened in your dream is real. This is the nature of Our dreams, we all experience dreams, and this is something that we can all understand. And also within the dream are different people and different objects in the environment around you. And when you are within the dream, it will feel that those different objects are all apart from you, and all of them have an independent existence. But once you wake up, you realize that they were not different people who had any independent existence, but they were all the projection within your mind. Your mind projected it, So you created them and you interacted with them and you experience them. And once you woke up, all of it was gone.

Speaker A [00:09:25]:

This is the nature of our dreams. Now to understand the nature of reality and to understand the nature of this waking world, we need to Understand the example of the dream very carefully. What the ancient Upanishads tell us is that just like a dream, Even this waking world is an illusion, and there is an absolute reality beyond this within which all of this is happening, and that absolute reality is you yourself. And when I say it is you yourself, I'm not referring to a personality or a mind, but the pure consciousness or awareness that is within you is within which all of these things are happening. That is what we need to understand. And once we wake up to that reality, this waking reality will seem like an illusion to us. And, of course, I'm not saying here that the dreams that we have and the waking experience that we have are both the same thing. Dream experience is totally different from the waking world.

Speaker A [00:10:32]:

And within the dreams, there are different parameters, and the dream world works totally differently when compared to the waking world. There are much more sophisticated laws that govern the waking world. And, you know, once we wake up, this life that we live in this waking world seems much more real compared to the dream world. That is absolutely true. But this does not mean that this waking world itself is the absolute reality. What we need to realize and what the ancient Upanishads tell us is that there is Another reality, call it God, call it absolute reality, call it consciousness or whatever you want, but this reality that you are Experiencing right now is a projection in that consciousness, and once you wake up and realize yourself As one with the existence, as one with this universe, as pure consciousness, then the world around you, the way you were Experiencing it before will seem like an illusion to you. This is the essential teaching of Advaita Vedanta. I hope you found some value in this episode.

Speaker A [00:11:42]:

Make sure to subscribe to the podcast and leave a review wherever you're listening to this. And also, if you are interested in these concepts, and if you want to get access to in-depth tutorials and systems and processes To understand the nature of reality and to create your life consciously the way you want it to be, you can visit advaita.com, and join the Advaita conscious society. Thank you, and I'll see you on the next episode.

Speaker A [00:00:00]:

This episode, we will understand what are the Vedas and Upanishads. So most of us have heard of these terms, but we do not truly understand what they are and what they represent. Let us broadly understand what Vedas are, what Upanishads are, and let us understand what is Advaita Vedanta. Vedas literally translate to knowledge. So Vedas represent the knowledge, and Vedas are said to be eternal and infinite, and many wonder how can a book be eternal and infinite. But when we say Vedas, it does not denote a mere book. Vedas represent something which is far beyond that. Vedas represent knowledge that is embedded or that is encoded at a different dimension, and Vedas exist beyond the physical dimension, and they are infinite and eternal.

Speaker A [00:01:06]:

Vedas within it has the knowledge of this entire reality and everything there is to this universe. For someone who is listening to this for the 1st time, it can be a little confusing to understand this. So let me explain it with a simple example. Now, we all are familiar with the Internet and how the World Wide Web works. So the Internet within itself has enormous amounts of knowledge and information, and it is accessible to everyone. Now imagine there is a tribe which is living in a small island just outside our city and they are not technologically evolved. They live in their own old ways and they do not have access to the Internet. And when we say they do not have access to the Internet and the information that is there within the Internet, we need to understand what we are saying here.

Speaker A [00:02:04]:

Of course, information is passing through us and passing around us, you know, and a lot of radio waves and different kinds of, frequencies and waves are passing through us. And a lot of information is embedded and encoded within these waves and frequencies. But they are not accessible to us because that tribe which is living far away from society in a forest, they do not have access to the right tools and technologies to access the Internet. If they could get hold of a laptop or a cell phone with a proper Internet connection, even they could access the information that is available on the Internet. So the information that is within the Internet is in a digital format, and only when we have the tools and technology to access that information and use that information when we be able to do that. Just like this, Vedas, which is the knowledge is at a different dimension. They exist at a different realm and a different dimension altogether. And the ancient rishis and yogis who worked on themselves and who through a lot of sadhana, through meditation, through yoga and various other methods, they were able to purify their minds and they were able to raise the frequency of their minds.

Speaker A [00:03:25]:

And through this, they were able to access the knowledge which is of that dimension, which are the Vedas. We can also put it in this way. The ancient Rishis of India worked on themselves and their mind so that they became compatible to receive the knowledge of the Vedas. And once they received that knowledge from that infinite ocean of the Vedas, they later on, you know, passed on that knowledge to the next generation so that it can help other people to understand the nature of reality and to live their lives in accordance with that knowledge. So this is how we need to understand the Vedas. Vedas are infinite and they are eternal. Nobody can destroy try it, nobody can conceive it in fullness, but all we can do is work on ourselves so that our system becomes compatible to receive that knowledge. And these Vedas are the foundation of Hinduism and the Sanatana Dharma.

Speaker A [00:04:28]:

Whatever we call as Hinduism today, is a consequence of that knowledge, which is the Vedas. And this is the significance of the Vedas. Upanishads are the final part of the Vedas. So Upanishads are also a part of the Vedas and they are the conclusions or the essential teaching of the Vedas. And they talk about philosophy hand about the nature of reality, and this is what we are interested in in this podcast. In the Advaita decoding reality podcast, our focus is to understand the nature of reality, to understand what this universe is, to understand who we are and what is our purpose in this magnificent universe and what is the point of everything? This is what we are focused on and Upanishads give us the answers to these questions. Now Vedas contain a broad range of knowledge. They encompass everything from rituals to cosmology to astrology and, Ayurveda, which deals in health care and different mantras, tantras, etcetera.

Speaker A [00:05:41]:

So Vedas cover a broad spectrum of knowledge about different aspects are about different subjects, but Upanishads are very specific. They get right to the point and they answer the philosophical questions about the nature of reality, about this universe. These are some of the common questions like, what is this universe about? What is God? Does God exist? Who created this universe, why are we here? What happens when we die? What is the nature of reality? How can we love a happy and fulfilled life? How can we come out of suffering? All of these fundamental questions that all of us have are directly answered by the Upanishads. Now this is the significance of Upanishads, and this is the most important teaching according to me. And I am in love with the Upanishads. Because throughout my life, I was trying to find answers to these questions and I had doubts about so many things in this universe. But once I started to understand what Upanishads are and once I started to listen to the teachings of Upanishads, everything started to make sense for me. At that point when I started to look at the Upanishads, I somehow something deep within me told me that this is the answer for the questions that you have.

Speaker A [00:07:07]:

Although I did not understand a lot about all these things then, something within me told me that this is the right direction and this is where you need to go. And so I started studying the Upanishads and, different teachings from different teachers like Sankaracharya, etcetera, to understand the nature of reality. And we will cover different aspects of this in the future episodes. Now Advaita Vedanta is just the direct and the most effective interpretation of the Vedas and Upanishads. Advaita simply means non dual, which means that this entire universe is just one which is expressed in infinite different ways. So we will look at the meaning of Advaita Vedanta and what Advaita Vedanta teaches us about the nature of reality in the next episode. Make sure to tune in for that. And if you are interested in these concepts, and if you want to go more deep into it, my new book, Decoding God, is available on Amazon in which I go into do different aspects of this universe and different ways in which we can understand the ultimate reality for God.

Speaker A [00:08:22]:

Thank you for tuning in, and I'll see you on the next episode.

Speaker A [00:00:00]:

Welcome to the Advaita decoding reality podcast. This is the 1st episode of this podcast, and I heartily welcome you to this podcast. And I want to, first of all, thank you for tuning in. Before we go ahead, I would like to take a few minutes to introduce myself and introduce this podcast. I'm Sujun Shetty. I'm an architect from India. I have my practice, and I also run my business. And for more than a decade, I Wanted to understand the nature of reality.

Speaker A [00:00:36]:

I always had this burning questions about of the nature of reality, about what is god, about whether god exists, who I am, what is my purpose, what is this life about, what will happen once we die. So these were all the philosophical questions that always used to come up in my mind, and I think most of us can resonate to this. Most of us get these questions from time to time, and these questions are just to find answers. But what happens is once we get a degree and once we get a job and once we are involved with the activities of life, these questions fade away to the background. But every now and then, when you pick up an interesting book or watch an intriguing movie, these questions surface again, and you are curious to find answers to them. For me, finding answers to these questions was very important. And for that, I started reading a lot of books, listening to a lot of teachings and audiobooks and, seminars, etcetera, to understand the nature of reality. I basically wanted to know what this life is about, and I also wanted to know How can I create my life consciously the way I want? Without surrendering to life based on how it is, I wanted to take charge of my life and create my life the way I wanted, and I also wanted to understand what life is.

Speaker A [00:02:09]:

I wanted to understand who I am and what this universe is about. Along my journey, as I said, I looked at various books, various teachings starting from the ancient Indian teachings of Vedas and Upanishads to the modern western teachings of law of attraction, manifestation, in conscious living, etcetera. So I started consuming a lot of knowledge in order to find out the nature of reality. And, of course, some of the teachings and some of the teachers that I came across were really profound, and they helped me understand a part of this reality. Along my journey, I came across the philosophy of Advaita Vedanta. Advaita is a Sanskrit word which literally translates to nondualism. Nondualism simply means that this entire existence as we See it, and as we perceive it, is an illusion. The duality in this world that we perceive is an illusion, and the real actual nature of, existence or the nature of reality is that it is nondual.

Speaker A [00:03:16]:

It is one pure consciousness which is being experienced in infinite number of phase. Of course, we will go very deep into this, and we will explore different ancient texts and different modern philosophies in the coming episodes. But to tell you what this podcast is going to be about. It is going to be about decoding the ancient scriptures and ancient texts, especially from India. The text pertaining to the Vedas and Upanishads and various Prakharana Granthas, which are the philosophical texts and teachings composed by great philosophers and teachers. Along with this, we will also look at the modern concepts of manifestation, law of attraction, how to create our lives consciously, the way we desire in order to live a comfortable and joyful life. So in this podcast, we will understand what consciousness is, and we'll also understand why quantum physicists and modern scientists are struggling to explain the nature of consciousness and how the ancient texts have the answers to the modern questions. I also will look at systematically understanding the nature of reality and understanding what this universe is about.

Speaker A [00:04:40]:

And by doing that, we will understand what Goddess, we will understand the nature of self, which is basically who you are, and we will understand the process of conscious creation, which is basically taking charge of our destiny and creating our lives consciously the way we want it to be, and I think this is very important for each and one of us to live a joyful fulfilled life. If you want to go more deep into these topics, I recently published my book decoding god, which is available on Amazon. So this is the 1st book in the decoding reality series. Here I go deep into the concept of God, how it has evolved, and the final answer to the question, does god exist? And if so, what is god and what is the proof of god? And for those of you who want to go further, we have also created a community cum learning platform where one can go into these topics in-depth, talk to different people who are interested in this topic and understand various teachings about the nature of reality and ancient Indian texts. We call this community platform as the Advaita Conscious Society. So you can join this community by visiting advaita.com. That is athbaitha.com. So this episode was basically about introducing this podcast to you.

Speaker A [00:06:09]:

I hope you have got a sense of what this is going to be about. Basically, it is going to be about understanding the nature of reality, the nature of self, and about understanding how to consciously create our lives the way we desire. Thank you for tuning in, and I will see you on the next episode.