Acharya Prashant explains that one rushes to the world only if it is seen as different from God. If you can see that the world is actually only an extension of God, then two things will happen. Using an analogy, he states that the world is the extended hand of God. If you are truly intelligent, upon seeing a beautiful and charming hand, you will not get attached to it but will be drawn to see the face, which must be even more beautiful. This is the approach of the religious man; this is how he relates to the world. The world is the extended hand of God. The approach of the wise man towards the world is neither of renunciation nor of attachment. The world is beautiful as an extension of God, and you say, 'If the world is so beautiful, how beautiful would be the center of this world, the source of this world?' One does not renounce the beauty of the hand, but one also does not get attached to it; rather, one moves towards the face. So, the world then is Shakti, the Mother Goddess, Kali. And the center of Shakti is Shiva. The world is an extension of Shiva in the form of Shakti. What you see spread all around yourself is nothing but Shiva in his dance. Shakti is nothing but Shiva in motion. Shri Ramakrishna was a worshipper of Shakti. When you are worshipping Shakti, you are worshipping nothing else but Shiva. If the face is somehow not available to be seen, you may as well worship the hand. When you are worshipping the world as mother, when you are worshipping woman as mother, you are actually worshipping Shiva, Truth. You are saying, 'Oh, if your creation can be so beautiful, how beautiful would you be?' When Ramakrishna would come across a lady, he would simply say, 'Mother'. By 'mother,' he meant Shakti. When he is prostrating to a woman, he is seeing in her the entire creation. Just as you can see in one grain of sand the entire sands of the world. By bowing to one woman, Ramakrishna is actually saluting the entire universe. And when he is saluting the universe, he is saluting the hand of God.