I remember well the first time I received the Bhagavad-gita. Someone gave it to me as a gift, and I was ready for it. I thought it the most practical and common sense book I had ever read. It confirmed a lot of my suspicions about the material world – there had to be more than this life of birth and death, there had to be answers for the unfairness that I saw everywhere, the concept of many lives, the broader details of the world and the universe, and the understanding of consciousness being the presence of the soul – ‘I think, therefore I am.’
I couldn’t put the book down. It turned my sense of self on it’s head. I was not this body carrying around a light called a soul, I was the soul, carrying around this body, in all it’s shapes and sizes.
For me, reading the Gita for the first time was like meeting an old friend, someone I had known before. There was immediate connection and understanding, a big ‘Aha’ moment. I felt freer than I had ever felt in my life. I loved the world and everyone in it. I felt connected and detached – at the same time!
It’s been thirty two years since I got my first Gita and my love for it has not waned. It’s at times so complex and deep that I feel I am in way over my head, and then so simple and direct that I marvel at it’s audacity. Death is as simple as changing your clothes. Get it?
The Bhagavad-gita, like all sacred books, has secrets and insights for us all, hidden in its pages. One has to approach it with an open mind and a sincere desire for something different. The Gita can change your level of thinking and experience of the world. If you let it.
Check out our Gita Marathon page or join me in my Gita Walk…
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