I Am Not This Body: Self Realization 101

We spend so many of our hours absorbed in the material, external energy of God (Krishna). It's become so habitual and second-nature to us. We, as conscious human beings, accept it as our collective reality. We know from various scriptures in various religions that the material world is temporary, illusory and not our true home. In theory it's easy to accept. In practice, not so much. We spend so much of our time trying to make a permanent situation for comfort and happiness while here.

Srila Gour Govinda Maharaja tells a wonderful, metaphorical story about the soul and how its experience here in the material world is like a person staying the night in a hotel or an inn. I've always loved that analogy. Here we are in this current life, in this current physical body, but our time here is like staying the night at a hotel. The morning comes and you have to check out. The whole time you're aware that this hotel room isn't your permanent place of residence. You're making plans for the next day, realizing that in the morning you'll have to leave.

Yet so many of us think and act and speak in such a way as if we'll be here forever. This is the power of the Lord's illusory energy (maya). We become myopic, narrow-focused and deluded. We become overwhelmed by the problems and responsibilities at hand. We become unable to step back and "see the bigger picture", as they say.

We spend so much time absorbed in illusory conceptions of self and in material identification that it's no wonder when aspiring devotees begin doubting the existence and reality of Sri Krishna. After all, from a completely mundane and materialistic view, Krishna Consciousness seems very mythological and absurd. God appearing as a gigantic fish? Or a boar? Or a turtle? There are so many topics and pastimes within the Vedas and more specifically the Srimad Bhagavatam that, from a materialistic, logical perspective, are completely unbelievable.

Understanding and realizing Sri Krishna and the transcendental, spiritual realm is not an easy thing. It has to begin with that most fundamental of realizations that His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Maharaja continuously and oft repeated: WE ARE NOT OUR BODIES! It seems so simple, so basic and yet it is so elusive in application and realization. I may be able to theoretically understand that I'm not my physical body, but can I live on such a platform of realization as my daily experience, at every moment? Unlikely.

That of course is the process of Krishna Consciousness or bhakti-yoga. It's a process of getting to that point of realization. If we can't even get to that first step, then there's no question of understanding Sri Krishna's transcendental guna (qualities), rupa (forms) and lila (pastimes). They're not accessible to those that are absorbed in a bodily conception of life.

It's this bodily conception of life that is the hallmark of material existence. Every single one of us is thinking we're this physical body and beyond that, the subtle mind with our personalities, desires and dispositions. But it's all an illusion. A grand act of deception carried out by the false ego (ahankara).

Of course we've all heard this a thousand times before. We've heard it in lectures, read it in books, heard it in a song. The problem is in actually REALIZING this truth and having it become our reality.

We must begin to become more absorbed in transcendence. Just as the person in the hotel is thinking about how they have to check out in the morning, we also have to think about where we're heading after this body dies. We have to begin surrounding ourselves with those things and those associations that will direct our attention towards the Supreme. That transcendental reality has to start becoming our reality. We have to start developing detachment to this material world and attachment towards Sri Krishna, the source of all beauty.

Spending enormous amounts of time and energy trying to be happy and comfortable in this material world is a futile endeavor. It's like the building of a sand castle on the shore of a beach, where the tide comes in and washes everything away. Better that we spend our time building a "castle" of devotion within our hearts that will remain even after the physical body dies.