121. Power of Namaste

‘Namaste’ or ‘Namaskaar’ is used to greet each other in the Indian context. Its meaning is ‘obeisance to divinity in you’. Greetings used in various cultures convey a similar message and have origins in “Seeing the self in all beings, all beings in the self and see the same everywhere” (6.29). When such greetings are exchanged with awareness, they have the potential to realise divinity in oneself as well as others.

Seeing the ‘same everywhere’ is the path of ‘formless’ or niraakaar, which is considered a difficult path (12.5). Krishna immediately makes it easy and says to see Him (Paramatma) everywhere and see all in Him (6.30), which is the path of ‘form’ or saakaar. These verses give the paths of realizing Paramatma through ‘form’ as well as ‘formless’ and all spiritual paths have their foundation in one or the other.

The unmanifested is limitless whereas the manifested is divisive and bound by limits. The realisation of ‘all in the self and the self in all’ is nothing but unity with the unmanifested. It is the realisation that the divisions we see around us are a result of the limitations of the senses, and that we need to transcend them to realise oneness. In the contemporary context, it is also called an abundance mentality or a win-win mindset and the lack of it is a scarce mentality resulting in lose-lose.

A point to be noted is that even after the realisation about the unmanifested sets in, the basics of manifested don’t change. We would still feel hungry and hence should keep performing karmas for survival (3.8). This was earlier referred to as bounden duty (6.1) or prescribed action by Krishna which is nothing but performing the action given to us in the present moment to the best of our abilities. It is like playing a role in a drama where praise and criticism of other artists don’t affect us as we don’t get attached to such praise or criticism.