View source for Almost every one of us is forgetful that "I am spirit soul. I am identifying with this body." And Prahlada Maharaja says because we have identified with this body, therefore we are always anxious, full of anxieties. And that is the fact

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[[Category:Almost Everyone]]
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[[Category:Forgetfulness]]
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[[Category:Identification With The Body]]
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<h2>Lectures</h2>
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<h3>Srimad-Bhagavatam Lectures</h3>
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Hitvātmā-ghāṭam gṛham andha-kūpaṁ. This material world is just like that blind well. If somebody falls down in it, it is very difficult to get out of it. Therefore it is ātmā-ghāṭam. Ātma-ghāṭam means killing the soul. How we are killing the soul? We forget that "I am spirit soul." Therefore almost every one of us is forgetful that "I am spirit soul. I am identifying with this body." And Prahlāda Mahārāja says because we have identified with this body, therefore we are always anxious, full of anxieties. And that is the fact. Therefore the whole process of knowledge is . . . I think some of my student, she is present here. She asked me, "What is knowledge?" The knowledge is that, "I am not this body." This is knowledge. Knowledge does not mean that how you can manufacture nuclear weapon. That is not knowledge. That is illusion.
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[[Vanisource:680701 - Lecture SB 07.09.08 - Montreal|680701 - Lecture SB 07.09.08 - Montreal]]
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Prahlāda Mahārāja says: "For all the proprietors of the body"—that means for everyone who has accepted this material body, all living entities—"that is the best thing." What is that? Sadā samudvigna-dhiyaṁ. And anyone who has accepted this material body, his symptom is that he is full of anxieties. This is the disease. To get this body, material body, means to remain always full of anxieties.

Either you become the first-class, I mean to say, executive head, President Johnson, or an ordinary man in the Bowery Street—everyone is full of anxiety. Not only human society but also bird society, beast society—everyone. Anyone who has got this material body, he's full of anxiety. But we want to get free from anxieties. That is our aspiration.

So Prahlāda Mahārāja suggests the remedy, how to become free from anxieties. He says, hitvātma-ghātaṁ gṛham andha-kūpaṁ. Ātma ghāṭam. Ātma means the soul, and ghāṭam means killing. Hitvātmā-ghāṭam gṛham andha-kūpaṁ. Andha-kūpa means blind well. Blind well . . . I do not know whether you have got experience. In India there are several old wells on the paddy fields, and they are covered with grass. Nobody can understand that there is a well underneath this, underneath this grass.

And if by mistake one comes there, he falls down, say hundred feet down. And it is covered with grass. Even if he cries, "Please save me, save me," who is going to save him? Sometimes cow and animals and men fall down in that way. If he's fortunate enough, somebody comes and rescues. Otherwise, generally, there is no rescue. Who is going to know that there is a man or there is an animal?

So hitvātmā-ghāṭam gṛham andha-kūpaṁ. This material world is just like that blind well. If somebody falls down in it, it is very difficult to get out of it. Therefore it is ātmā-ghāṭam. Ātma-ghāṭam means killing the soul. How we are killing the soul? We forget that "I am spirit soul." Therefore almost every one of us is forgetful that "I am spirit soul. I am identifying with this body." And Prahlāda Mahārāja says because we have identified with this body, therefore we are always anxious, full of anxieties. And that is the fact.

Therefore the whole process of knowledge is . . . I think some of my student, she is present here. She asked me, "What is knowledge?" The knowledge is that, "I am not this body." This is knowledge. Knowledge does not mean that how you can manufacture nuclear weapon. That is not knowledge. That is illusion. Real knowledge is to know the simple fact that, "I am not this body." That's all. But that knowledge is very rare. And to acquire that knowledge, there are so many systems. That system is called self-realization.

There is yoga system, there is jñāna system, jñāna-yoga, dhyāna-yoga, karma-yoga. There are so many yoga systems simply to come to the platform of this knowledge that, "I am not this body." And as soon as one comes to this platform that, "I am not this body," then what happens to him? Brahma-bhūtaḥ, self-realization. And what is that self-realization? What is the symptom? How I can understand that one is self-realized? Prasannātmā. He's jolly. (laughter) The . . . so long we do not come to that platform of knowledge, we are full of anxieties. And as soon as we come to the platform of knowledge that, "I am not this body," the immediate symptom is joyfulness, prasannātmā.

How that prasannātmā is manifested? Everything is there. Na śocati na kāṅkṣati. Śocati means lamentation, and kāṅkṣati means hankering. These two things will disappear. Śocati, if we lose something, then we lament, "Oh, I have lost so much money," "I have lost my son," "I have lost my service," and so many things. And kāṅkṣati, kāṅkṣati means, "I haven't got this, I want this, I haven't got this." These two kinds of diseases makes us always full of anxieties. Why you are anxious? For these two things, śocati and kāṅkṣati: lamentation for the loss and hankering after which we do not possess.
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