An intellectually invigorating ‘awareness’ class
I vividly remember a discussion during the “Awareness” class of my MSc days at the Sri Sathya Sai Institute of Higher Learning. The teacher present was Prof.G.Venkataraman, a highly reputed and accomplished man of science in India. The professor had his unique style of conducting awareness classes. He would force us to think deeply to arrive at answers to profound question. He would stitch together deep spirituality with the practical problems the world faces. He always looked forward to questions because he believed that life is not about getting the correct answers but about asking the right questions. (In fact, I remembered his inspiring presence in the classroom with excitement when my Master, Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai Baba told me to join Radiosai as my place of work. GV as he is popularly called was the director under whom I had to report.)
The discussion in class that day was about the omnipresence of God. It started with a question from the professor.
“What is God?” he asked the whole class.
Among the plethora of answers that came was one which said,
“God is the omnipresent, omnipotent and omniscient one.”
“Okay”, challenged GV sir, “what do you mean by omnipresent? How is it that God is omnipresent?”
There were no satisfactory answers in the beginning but soon, one boy stood up and answered,
“Sir. God is energy. Energy is God. Since every atom is a storehouse of energy, God is everywhere.”
“Very good”, GV sir was happy, “that is something that everyone recognizes - energy in all matter. In fact, the great Albert Einstein even equated mass with energy with his famous equation. And since everything in the universe has some mass, everything has energy. But that is only one level of God’s omnipresence. He is present in a subtler plane as well. What is that?”
Again, a lot of discussion and thought resulted in the next answer,
“God is life. Life is God. Life is subtler than energy and that is probably why nobody has been able to define what exactly life is. But everyone recognizes life - and when it leaves.”
“Beautiful!” exclaimed the professor, “That is precisely why a son or daughter kneels before the body of the father crying - Father! Why did you leave me? - The body is still there and yet the child knows that the father is gone. Life is sacred. Life is God. Good. But then, there is the subtlest way in which God is present. Do you know that?”
Since there was a muted silence now, the professor threw a hint.
“Everything in the universe is made up of atoms and thus contains energy. However, plants and animals are considered special because they have ‘life’ which the other things of the universe don’t have. Man is considered even more special because he exhibits God present in yet another level. What is that?”
There were no answers and GV sir answered,
“God is present in man as the conscience. No doubt God is present in us as the life force or praana but that alone too would not help to develop awareness; if that was the case, then donkeys and camels would have turned spiritual long ago. Humans alone have that ability because God is present in humans at a third and higher level, as the conscience or the divine voice in our spiritual heart. However, though each human is gifted with the conscience, it is so subtle that one can often get disconnected from it. It is the birthplace of all goodness and nobility in man. Just ensure that you experience God’s omnipresence at all these three levels and you are good to go. That is true awareness - to recognise God’s omnipresence at all these three levels.”
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| Credit: Musings on Awareness |
With that, we can move on to an experience at the passport office that gave me an insight or two about God’s presence in our lives.
