Embrace Your Divinity Within
Happy Friday, folks. How are y’all holding up? All’s good here and just yesterday before I was off to bed I came across this wonderful piece of work by Swami Vivekananda that I wish to share with y’all. The headline attracted me as it talked about religion and how religion affects us in our daily lives.
I have noticed that in almost all of his lectures Swamiji had very little fondness reserved for the traditional ways of observing religion like keeping fasts, tormenting the self and most importantly believing that there is something out there which is going to help me out of my crisis. A constant search and a belief in an unknown knight in shining armour. Even though Swamiji doesn’t have the slightest disregard for any of these practices, he constantly insists that we find out and discover that all of the power lies inside of us.
He asks us to embrace our divinity within and be our own knight in shining armours. If you are reading this for the first time, all of this might sound absolutely rattling, and strange. Understandable. But just think to yourself and remember all those times when you were in distress, wasn’t it you that pulled yourself out of the pit and marched forward? Was it not you who unknowingly used your hidden power?
And that should be a difficult task, says Swamiji and he shares that this kind of power is available to us all the time. We must have the courage to pursue it and listen to it very intently. Of course, he does talk of failures that are sure to follow. But from the place of strength that he comes from, Swamiji said that one might fail a thousand times, but he must never ever give up. Instead, he must try one more time.
He believed that all the religious doctrines and dogmas are but secondary, and the goal of mankind should be to manifest the divinity that is already present in us. What profound thinking! There are psychologists too that hold the view today that before seeking pleasures outside in the world, we must try to discover them within.
I have often been wondering whether or not this could be true. Is it at all feasible that we, the mortal creatures are so very powerful? Are we not these petty creatures that are dependent on material things? Yes and no. Yes only if we choose to see ourselves through this little lens of body and mind, and no if we can identify ourselves with the ever unchanging and non-dual consciousness.
Imagine on an ordinary day when you are being rebuked by your boss over an assignment, you are super underconfident and just feel like giving up, and then suddenly if you could remind yourself of your true nature that you are fearless and that there is no force on earth that can tell us otherwise or bind you down.
When you practice this you would discover an immense sense of power and strength come to you, this is what will guide you forward and help you cross all hurdles of life. This is the divinity that Swamiji was talking about. Now that you know it, embrace it.
