The world is great gymnasium where we come to make ourselves strong. ~ Swami Vivekananda
Acharya Prashant: By being in the world you reach the source of all strength, what happens in the gymnasium by being in the gymnasium? Where do you reach?
To your strength.
The implication is, the world is a gymnasium that will facilitate your access to the source of all strength. The source of all strength is the Self, the Truth, the Atman, you are anyway in the world, you have to go to the root of the world, and there you find the Truth, the source of all power.
Which means you cannot really avoid the world, which means you cannot avoid your situations, you have to acknowledge them, and you have to understand them, you cannot escape away, you must know what is going on, and to know what is going on, first of all, you must honestly admit to what is going on.
If you keep giving it false names, if you keep calling attachment as love, then what will you come to know? You have already said it is love. You have to, first of all, see what your real life condition is, in seeing that you will only see how powerless you are, how weak you are; that seeing is the key to strength.
This is strange!
When you see that you are weak, the seeing is the strength. When you see that you are conditioned, that seeing is the freedom from conditioning.
When you will look at the world, you will only see a lot of chains, bondage; but that seeing is the freedom from bondage.
What is the nature of the gymnasium?
The gymnasium only gives you obstacles, have you ever noticed?
You want to ‘raise’ something.
What is the gymnasium giving you?
Weights.
Weights are obstacles against the rise, the world is anyway an obstacle, but when you, with courage go close to the obstacle and face them, then not only do you get the obstacles, more importantly, you also get that, which empowers you beyond the obstacles.
The gymnasium does not really support you, it actually obstructs you, in that sense, it is very much like the world. It is an obstruction. Note what the gym gives you, obstructions, obstacles, it is through the obstacles, that you discover your way.
It is in the middle of the problem that you find the solution.
You don’t escape the problem, you go right through the problem, you go right into the heart of the problem; and there lies the solution.
