Category:Forgetting Our Real Identity
Theme Analysis
This category explores the root cause of our entanglement in the material world: spiritual amnesia. Śrīla Prabhupāda explains that forgetfulness is not an accident but a requirement for material existence—to enjoy matter, we must forget we are spirit.
- The Prerequisite for Illusion: Śrīla Prabhupāda states a profound psychological truth: "Unless a living entity forgets his real identity, it is impossible for him to live in the material conditions of life." We cannot play the role of the master if we remember we are the servant.
- The Cause of Fear: The category links fear directly to identity. Since the soul is deathless, the fear of death only exists because we have wrongly identified with the perishable body.
- The Trap of Advancement: A counter-intuitive theme is that material "progress" (scientific or economic) often serves only to deepen our forgetfulness, making us more attached to the temporary body.
- The Awakening: The solution is to hear the call "Jīv jāgo!" (Wake up, sleeping soul!) and remember our true position as eternal servants.
- Explore the synthesized essence of this category in this Vanipedia article: Cost of Forgetting Our Real Identity.
Pages in category "Forgetting Our Real Identity"
The following 20 pages are in this category, out of 20 total.
B
- Brahma first created the nescient engagements like self-deception, the sense of death, anger after frustration, the sense of false ownership, and the illusory bodily conception, or forgetfulness of one's real identity
- By forgetting one's real identity, one is sure to be afraid of death, although a pure living soul is deathless and birthless
I
- I offer my respectful obeisances unto the SPG, by whose illusory energy the jiva, who is part and parcel of God, forgets his real identity because of the bodily concept of life. I take shelter of the SPG, whose glories are difficult to understand
- In the age of Kali material activities of different varieties, in the name of advancement of human civilization, take place, and the living entities become more and more involved in forgetting their real identity - the spiritual nature
T
- The conditioned soul, being in contact with material nature, forgets his real identity; therefore when he sees himself in the conditioned state, he identifies himself with the body
- The illusory potency, maya, constantly terrorizes and shackles the people in the present Age of Quarrel, Kali-yuga. Due to forgetting their real identity as spirit souls, they bring disaster to the world
- The living entity cannot be forgetful of his real identity unless influenced by the avidya potency. Because the living entity is prone to the influence of the avidya potency, he can never equal the supreme potent
- The living entity forgets his real identity as spirit soul, Brahman, and instead of realizing his factual position thinks himself the product of the material energy
- The more we advance in so-called material happiness or material advancement, the more we forget our real identity. This is the result
- The Nagapatnis said, "By Your (Krsna's) activities only, the living entities become covered by forgetfulness or discover their real identity"
- The personified Vedas continued, "When elevated to the human form of life, they identify with a particular class of men, or a particular nation or race or so-called religion, forgetting their real identity as eternal servants of Your Lordship"
- The same Vedic mantra (uttisthata jagrata) is sung by Bhaktivinode Thakura, jiv jago, jiv jago. So we have to awaken them. They are sleeping under the spell of maya, and forgotten his real identity, and suffering - not only this life, life after lifetime
- There are varieties of material existence for the living entity according to the work he performs in ignorance or forgetfulness of his real identity. If anyone enters into that forgetfulness, he is unable to understand where his movements will end