View source for Everyone has his individuality: "I am this," "I am very learned," "I am very beautiful," "I am white," "I am black," "I am Indian," "I am American," this is called ego. So this egotism is there, but we cannot see it

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[[Category:Everyone]]
[[Category:Individuality]]
[[Category:I Am]]
[[Category:Very Learned]]
[[Category:Very Learned]]
[[Category:Very Beautiful]]
[[Category:Very Beautiful]]
[[Category:White - Skin Color]]
[[Category:White - Bodily Concept of Life]]
[[Category:Black - Skin Color]]
[[Category:Black - Bodily Concept of Life]]
[[Category:Indian]]
[[Category:Indian - Bodily Concept of Life]]
[[Category:American]]
[[Category:American - Bodily Concept of Life]]
[[Category:This is Called...]]
[[Category:Ego]]
[[Category:Cannot See]]
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<h2>Lectures</h2>
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<h3>Bhagavad-gita As It Is Lectures</h3>
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Every one of us knows that there is a mind, but we cannot see it. What is that mind? Everyone knows that there is intelligence, but nobody can see what is that intelligence. Similarly, everyone has his individuality: "I am this," "I am very learned," "I am very beautiful," "I am white," "I am black," "I am Indian," "I am American," this is called ego. So this egotism is there, but we cannot see it. They are very fine things. There is existence, but our this present material eyes, material senses can have experience of the grosser type of materials, not of the subtler or finer types of material.
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[[Vanisource:710913 - Lecture BG 02.13 - Mombasa|710913 - Lecture BG 02.13 - Mombasa]]
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The basic principle of spiritual understanding . . . the basic principle of spiritual understanding is to know the spirit soul first of all. What is that spirit soul? That spirit soul is within this body. Dehinaḥ asmin dehe. Asmin, "this"; asmin means this, and dehe means the body. Asmin dehe, in this body, there is spirit soul who is called dehī. Dehī means one who possesses this body.

Just like your coat, your shirt, you possess this coat and shirt, not that you are the coat and the shirt. Try to understand clearly. This is my shirt; I am not this. I am different. I am within the shirt. Similarly, this body, this is gross, coat. Just like you, when you put on your dress, you have one underwear, shirt, and then over that shirt there is coat. It is very easy to understand; there is no difficulty.

Similarly, the spirit soul is within this coat and shirt. What is this coat? This gross body. There are five . . . eight material elements: earth, water, fire, air, ether, mind, intelligence and ego. These are eight material elements. And out of these eight, gross elements we can see or perceive with your material senses. I can touch this earth; I can taste the water; I can smell the air; I can feel the sky. In this way. These are gross.

And still there are finer elements, just like mind. Every one of us knows that there is a mind, but we cannot see it. What is that mind? Everyone knows that there is intelligence, but nobody can see what is that intelligence. Similarly, everyone has his individuality: "I am this," "I am very learned," "I am very beautiful," "I am white," "I am black," "I am Indian," "I am American," this is called ego. So this egotism is there, but we cannot see it. They are very fine things. There is existence, but our this present material eyes, material senses can have experience of the grosser type of materials, not of the subtler or finer types of material.

So there are three finer types of material and five gross materials, altogether eight. Bhūmir āpo 'nalo vayuḥ khaṁ mano buddhir eva, bhinnā me prakṛtir aṣṭadhā ([[Vanisource:BG 7.4 (1972)|BG 7.4]]). These are the external energy of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Everything that we experience, they are different energies of the Lord. Just like we can feel there is fire when we feel heat or light.

We don't see the fire directly, but when we feel warm, we consider there must be fire. Or if there is heat . . . I mean there is light, that is fire. Similarly, we can experience the presence of the Lord by His different energies. Parasya brahmaṇaḥ śaktis yathaiva akhilaṁ jagat (Viṣṇu Purāṇa 1.22.52) . . . this whole material manifestation, because we can see only material things, gross things; but we cannot see, but we can perceive the finer materials.

So the finer materials: the mind, intelligence and egotism, and still finer is the soul. Try to understand. There is soul, but because we have got no vision to see, we think . . . the so-called scientists, philosophers, they are under conclusion that there is no soul, this is only body, that's all. This is the disease of this present material world. They are . . . they have no knowledge practically what is the basic principle of this life, and still they are passing on as scientist, philosophers, religionist, yogīs, svāmīs, but they have no knowledge . . . clear conception of the soul, they have no knowledge.

So that clear conception of soul you can have from the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Kṛṣṇa. He is speaking to Arjuna, and that is recorded by Vyāsadeva and which is presented before us as the Bhagavad-gītā. So we are presenting the knowledge of the Bhagavad-gītā, as it is, without any malinterpretation. Because we cannot interpret Bhagavad-gītā. Bhagavad-gītā is spoken by God, so what He has spoken, there cannot be any mistake, there cannot be any illusion, there cannot be any cheating and there cannot be any imperfectness of the senses.

Others, those who are called conditioned soul . . . just like we have got our eyes, but the eyes . . . we are very much proud of our eyes. We say: "Can you show me God?" But the thing is that whether you can see God, whether you have got the requisite eyes to see God? Just like in your presence there are so many planets—leaving aside all other planets, the sun and the moon.

Every one of us can see in day and night, but still they haven't got sufficient knowledge about the sun and the moon. Why? Because their senses are imperfect. But still they are trying to explain about the sun and moon. That is cheating. They have no sufficient knowledge about the sun or the moon, still they are trying to speak about sun and moon.

If you have no sufficient knowledge on a subject matter and if you want to enlighten others with your speaking, that is cheating. Because you have no sufficient knowledge, why you are speaking to others? That is cheating. He is posing that, "I know," but he does not know. This is cheating. Imperfectness of senses. They are declaring that "We are studying the planetary system by," what is called, "telescope." But who has manufactured this telescope? You have manufactured, or your brother has manufactured. But he has got imperfect senses. How the telescope will be perfect?

So this is going on. They are simply cheating public. They have no sufficient knowledge, still they are trying to speak of some subject of which they have no sufficient knowledge. Besides that, the scientist . . . one scientist proposes, theorizes something today, and another scientist makes this proposition, this theory, null and void and he speaks something else. That is also due to the imperfect of senses.
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