Make Mahavira your ideal!

Disciple:-  What ideal should we follow now?


Swami Vivekananda:- You have now to make charachter of Mahavira your ideal. See how at the command of Ramachandra he crossed the ocean. He had no care for life or death! He was a perfect master of his senses and wonderfully sagacious. 

You have now to build your life on this great ideal of personal service. Through that, all other ideals will gradually manifest in life. Obedience to the Guru without questioning, and strict observance of Brahamacharya- this is the secret of success. 

As on the one hand Hanuman represent the ideal of service, so on the other hand he represents leonine courage, striking the whole world with awe. He has not the least hesitation in sacrificing his life for the good of Rama. A supreme indifference to everything except the service of Rama, even to the attainment of the status of Brahma and Shiva, the great World-Gods! Only the carrying out of Shri Rama's best is the one vow of his life! Such whole-hearted devotion is wanted. 

Playing on the Khol and Kartal and dancing in the frenzy of Kirtana has degenerated the whole people. They are, in the first place, a race of dyspeptics-and if in addition to this they dance and jump in that way, how can they bear the strain? In trying imitate the highest Sadhana, the preliminary qualification for which is absoulute purity, they have been swallowed in dire Tamas. 

In every distirct and village you may visit, you will find only the sound of the Khol and Kartal! Are not drums made in the country? Are not trumpets and kettle-drums available in India? make the boys hear the deep-toned sound of these instruments. Hearing from boyhood the sound of these effeminate forms of music and listening to kirtana, the country is well-nigh converted into a country of women. What more degradation can you expect? Even the poet's imagination fails to draw this picture! The Damaru (An hour-glass shaped drum,held in Shiva's hand) and horn have to be sounded, drums are to be beaten so as to raise the deep and martial notes, and with "Mahavira, Mahavira" on your lips and shouting "Hara,Hara,Vyom,Vyom", the quarters are to be reverbeated. 

The music which awakens only softer feelings of man is to be stopped now for some time. Stopping the light tunes such as Kheal and Tappa for some time, the people are to be accustomed to hear the Dhrupad music. Through the thunder-roll of the dignified Vedic hymns, life is to be brought back into the country. In everything the austere spirit of heroic manhood is to be revived.

In following such an ideal lies the good of the people and the country. If you can build your character after such an ideal, then thousand others will follow. But take care that you do not swerve an inch from the ideal. Never loose heart, in eating,dressing, or lying, in singing or playing, in enjoyment or disease, always manifest the highest moral courage. 

Then only will you attain the grace of Mahashakti, the Divine Mother.