Hari Krishna Hari Krishna
Krishna Krishna Hari Hari
Hari Ram Hari Ram
Ram Ram Hari Hari
At our core, we each desire the experience of Divine Love, that which connects us to and reminds us of the Source from which we emanate. In our relationships with one another, however, human love usually displays merely a sliver at best—or a shattered fragment at worst—of that which we are capable of at our core. Playing in the Maya of illusion, the dance of opposites takes us through a myriad of emotional experiences falling somewhere along and within the polarities of pleasure and pain. The remembrance of and the invocation of Krishna consciousness within is that which reconnects us to the compassionate Divine Love of the Universe, that which dissolves opposites and allows us to remember the Bliss from which we originate.
Krishna means “black” or “dark one,” which some may think counterintuitive to what is actually inferred through his representation as a “light-bringer.” I believe this points us in a very profound direction and gives clear instruction for how we are able to reconnect with Source Power within. For it is in the darkness, by facing the shadows within our own being, by staring into the gaping wounds which plague us as human incarnations, and feeling them, that we can dissolve away the coverings holding the secret of Divine Love.
Radha and Krishna
Many are familiar with Krishna in association with Radha, his beloved and consort. In the stories of Radha and Krishna, though Krishna has many gopis who love and adore him and who he loves, it is Radha who is his supreme counterpart and the most devoted of all his beloveds. Where the gopis symbolize the five senses in the external world, Radha represents the Shakti, the Kundalini life force energy (which directs consciousness to the pineal gland and offers enlightenment). When we unite opposite poles within our body temple, the magnetic and electric, the masculine and feminine, the logic mind with intuition, we are embodying the sacred marriage of Krishna with Radha.
In this story of Krishna and his Beloved counterpart Radha, we learn that access to the Divine love of our Krishna consciousness within, and the ability to see through eyes of the nondual, comes through unifying poles within the body and hemispheres in the brain. Therefore, connection to divine, compassionate love is a natural process which can be experienced if we are willing to take the steps necessary to unite with our beloved within and ascend the kundalini upwards through various practices such as yoga, martial arts, or other devotional acts.
The Gita and Krishna
The Bhagavada Gita is the ultimate karma yogic text, and one of the main Hindu spiritual scriptures. In the Gita, Lord Krishna appears to the main character Arjuna, who is preparing to go onto the battlefield with members of his kin. The symbology is rich in this work, but one of the key elements is that of the presence of Krishna as a Divine Guide. Krishna continues to offer the perspective of the presence of unwavering love no matter what the outward appearance may hold. That even in the face of seeming disaster and betrayal of love, there is still the choice—the opportunity to see Divine Love anyway—within that which seems to lack it.
A surface-read of the Gita will present the reader with the scene of a battlefield and brothers warring with each other, the struggle of karma and the ability to surrender to one’s dharmic path through Divine Love. A bit deeper contemplation will reveal the battlefield to be an inner one, and the warring brothers as thoughtforms which keep one bound to the wheel of karma, reincarnation and duality consciousness. In surrendering to a dharmic path, or one’s soul mission, the reader finds him/herself as Arjuna—the warrior who must choose to know Love above all else. The battlefield is ultimately an illusion, the Maya we have created in order to experience the separation from Source and our eventual return to it.
The reader, when contemplating the Bhagavada Gita further, will find they are Krishna too—that we all have the innate capacity to see ourselves off the wheel of karma by realizing Divine Love as the leading force in our lives, and all else as simply a step on the return unto it.
In yoga school we studied the Gita as the ultimate text on Karma yoga, and I am beginning to see how this is so. Krishna consciousness is the part of us which is beyond time, beyond the matrix, beyond karma. It is the aspect within us which knows that the dance we play in, the Leela of reality, is just that—a divine play meant for our enjoyment. Karma is the effect of actions, which can show up in either a positive or a negative way. It is the belief in time and duality and it stays in effect for us as long as we decide to stay stuck in the illusion and live within its confines. Krishna consciousness points the way back to dharma, the soul’s ultimate path…that which is beyond time because it is us. When we are free from karmic illusion, we realize that we are the dharma.
Arjuna is the human mind wishing to understand the battle he is to be a part of and is resisting. He does not want to fight his own family, though Krishna reminds him that it is his dharma to do so. In my interpretation, Krishna is the infinite, eternal aspect of us which knows that we simply must do battle with the lower mind, we must face every thoughtform and karmic tie (which families are and represent) and conquer them, in effect, by living authentically true to our Soul Essence.
Krishna in the World Today
In this very potent time we are living in, Krishna consciousness is a state of Divine devotion and boundless love that we are just beginning to see starting to push its way into the reality before us. It is as though this state of ecstatic divine love has been in hibernation within the hearts and psyches of humans, that perhaps we were not even allowed to access this graceful, limitless love again in this world until the ages turned yet again towards that of truth and disillusionment. We are in this veil-renting phase of evolution now, I believe, and Krishna’s awareness of the non-dual found within the observer eye with heart on the One is again emerging within us all.
In the most practical way, I am seeing Krishna play out in my life in the form of some work I have been doing in order to realize love more fully. This work I do is with my Integrative Consciousness Coach, Lisa Kaye. Her work is absolutely cutting edge and extraordinary. The assignments she gives me and the questions she poses to my consciousness are asking me to integrate duality at the deepest level in order to find the love that I seek is truly living within me all the while. The more that I am able to see how those who come into my reality are showing me exactly what I need in order to open more fully to love, the closer I get to seeing the Divine manifest in front of me. Krishna is peeking into me daily. He is doing so through the eyes of those who show up to love me, and who I may find bring me less than what I fully desire. Integrative Consciousness work is asking me to look directly into the shadows, into the realm of the dark-skinned one, and dance there, shamelessly. I have realized Krishna consciousness more profoundly in my life since beginning to work with Lisa than at any other time in my life.
In order to invoke Krishna consciousness in your awareness and in your life now, you could say something like:
“I now choose to enact the aspect of myself which IS Krishna awareness. That part of me that knows that divine, eternal, compassionate Love is the only truth existing and that all else manifesting in my perceived reality is merely an attempt to get me to remember such. I call forth this boundless love from every cell of my body and into every breath. I ask that it enliven my words, blaze from my eyes, and emanate from my heart in every interaction I have this day so that all beings with whom I commune with this day will remember with me, this Love that we are—and dance with me in it. I say to that part of me, which is Krishna, who resides in the unseen dark void of my being, Come Forth! And bring with you all of my fears and shortcomings, all of my wounds and regrets so that I may soothe them with the balm of this Eternal Love ever oozing from my Core. I ask that when in the presence of others that my Krishna state commune with theirs and that we may all become more aware of the fact that we are all just walking each other home to Love.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Rjmmv9GFN0&feature=youtu.be
