Exciting Spiritual Dimensions

Sri Ramakrishna, a monk with little formal education, lived in superconsciousness and changed the world of spiritual thought. (Sri Ramakrishna is not to be historically confused with Sri Krishna, the avatar and king who lived in India many centuries before Christ, and who is the spiritual focus of the modern Hare Krishna movement.)

He was considered, as mentioned earlier, an avatar, or an Incarnation, by millions of people. A number of his central points are found, fully or partly, in religious and philosophical thought throughout the world; but some of his ideas are new to mankind. His views are particularly interesting to seekers of higher consciousness. Leaders — and followers — of many religious paths study his words and the way he lived in God-consciousness.

Since Sri Ramakrishna dedicated his life to replacing the bloodshed and hatred between people of different religions with love and appreciation, his uplifting precepts have become very popular throughout the world. Politicians, as well as priests, take hope in his teachings about true brotherhood and world peace.

To simply ponder one of the following spiritual concepts which Sri Ramakrishna shared with humanity in the last century will likely fill you with amazement and hope at the spiritual potential hiding within you and all others who seek a better life and a more spiritual world.

You may wish to consider each of these ideas as possibilities for you. They are grand possibilities, indeed. Even better, meditate on these great truths so that you can experience them.

1. All people are spiritual beings, individual expressions of the Divine.
2. This is a spiritual world, comprised of Spirit (conscious energy).
3. Each person is called in his or her own way to make mind and body subtle enough to attune with the soul and with the Lord.
4. Man’s yearning for God, love, and wisdom is natural, valid, and divine.
5. All the main religions are from God, provided by His infinite love and wisdom.
6. Religion must be dynamic.
7. When devotees of different paths embrace their own path fully and experience the Lord’s nature, they will become tolerant and appreciative of the other God-given religions.
8. Religious differences are as important as their similarities. In appreciating the views of others, one will often be enriched and inspired on one’s own path.
9. Spiritual pride, bigotry, and exclusivity limit the seeker from spiritual experience.
10. The living soul in each person actively yearns for a spiritual relationship.
11.  The living soul in each person actively strives for a dynamic, creative expression of Truth, Beauty, and Goodness.
12. Suffering and confusion is a result of man trying to halt his soul’s creative, loving expression of spiritual values.
13. The aspirant is precious in the eyes of the Lord. One’s individuality is God-given and the ego is not to be hated but appreciated and developed into a spiritual relationship.
14. God can be experienced in both form and formlessness.
15. Meditation and prayer are among the most direct ways to experience God. one’s soul, and divine realities.
16. Through devoted meditation and prayer, the cells of the physical body become divinized, spiritually transformed, to enter a new dimension of interplay with one’s Creator.
17. A new species of man is thus emerging. The divinized body is developed through receiving spiritual radiance into every thought, breath, and cell.
18. Through the divinized body, a new relationship is established between God and man. It is an eternal play of love between the devotee and his or her dear Lord God.
19. The purpose of spiritual practice is to become attuned enough to realize that the Kingdom of God is at hand, that God is here – now.
20. Enlightenment is often gradual, a continuous, ever-new process, always developing. Spontaneous awakening is rare, but also occurs.
21. Repressed, ignored desires always cause sorrow. Desires, when faced with clarity and meditation, are transformed by God’s power and one’s character becomes stronger.
22. God is Divine Mother as well as Father and Son, available to all seeking comfort, delight, and refuge.
23. One ideally lives from Spirit first. If you allow, the higher plane always controls the lower.
24. There is no end to God-realization. No matter what you have realized, there is something more.
25. Individual spiritual experiences, thoughts, and actions help all of humanity because they radiate love and energy to the whole planet. One’s individual experiences and realizations benefit all other lives on this good earth.

Sri Ramakrishna often said the easiest way for you—for most people—to know God is real, and to experience God as your dear Lord, is to focus your mind on thought of the Divine Beloved while chanting His (Her) name, repetitiously and with love. Don’t chant vain, mindless repetitions; but chant with attention, even adoration, as best you can. You could also chant some attribute of the Lord, like love or peace, and experience God through that quality. “Chant the name and glories of God” was Sri Ramakrishna’s most frequent advice to people seeking spiritual experience, human happiness, or both.

Hopefully you’ll find these possibilities breathtakingly exciting and you’ll wish to explore them with your heart and mind. Often the spiritual possibilities made known to man are so far ahead of the general consciousness of people that it takes a lot of living and a great deal of trial and error before one begins to sense that spiritual potentialities are perfectly real.

If you’re already a person of deep faith, what joy must be yours in personally experiencing each of the dimensions made clearly known to you through your dear scriptures.

However you proceed toward the fascinating capacities available to you as part of your inheritance, as part of the very gift of life which you possess, you can know for a certainty that your life will be richer. Likely, you’ll have, through awakening into your true nature, more material success and physical well being. You’ll know greater emotional wholeness and the beauty of being able to give and receive true, lasting love. You will know the other aspects of happy thought — peace, contentment, ecstasy, and ever-new joy. You will know mental clarity and have the ability to use your mind as a dear friend rather than as most people have to live: their mind is their worst enemy, a most destructive, worrying, turbulent, self-destructive entity.

You’ll know who you really are, instead of having to put up with a thrown-together, makeshift ego. You will discover your true self through your higher consciousness and be able to make a genuine contribution in the lives of your loved ones. You’ll become enabled to express your nature for the benefit of humanity as well.

Of course, you will know the indescribable joy of living in attunement with your higher consciousness. Merely to be in a state of attunement with it is to know that you have been welcomed home. You are finally living in your true state. Your life gives up its boredom because so many wonderful talents within you interplay with one another and with the world. Your life becomes what is called a lila, a play or dance of awareness, an interplay between human being and creation, a conscious relationship and dance between your life and your world.

What are your personal possibilities in discovering the dimensions and richness of your higher consciousness? Only you — deep within your being — can say.