Swami Vivekananda

Submitted one article on Swami Vivekananda for MEGHADRI, BCA departmental magazine first issue, Raja N. L. Khan Women's Collegge, scheduled to be published shortly. Following is the article.  

Once upon a time when Swami Vivekananda was still known as Narendra Nath Datta, expressed his desire to remain absorbed in meditation like the sage Shukdeva in front of his spiritual master Sri Ramakrishna Deva. In reply, Sri Ramakrishna Deva rebuked him and told him to be like a banyan tree under which many people would get shelter and relief. Let us first see a glimpse of life of Swami Vivekananda.

Swami Vivekananda was born to Biswanath Datta and Bhubaneswari Devi. Bhubaneswari Devi was a very pious lady and prayed a lot to Lord Biswanath and Bireswar of Kashi which is now known as Varanasi. From the childhood only, meditation was very natural to him and shown a great mind concentration power by learning the class lessons from teachers just by listening the discourses from the teachers. He was a natural leader among his childhood friends and had interests in diverse fields such as music, wrestling, playing cricket. As he grew up, he started interest in spiritualism and used to attend the prayer sessions of Bramho Samaj. While studying in the General Assembly Institution, presently known as Scottish Church College, Professor William Hastie mentioned the example of Sri Ramakrisha of Dakshineswar to explain the poem of Wordsworth. Later on Narendranath, representative of Western educated, logical, debating class came in touch with so called not so formally educated Sri Ramakrishna and judged him from different angles before finally recognizing him as his spiritual master. Sri Ramakrishna identified Narendranath as the future world teacher and messenger to the masses of India as well as the world. Before taking the renunciation, Narendranath witnessed severe poverty and legal battle over an unholy attempt to dislodge his family from their home after sudden death of his father.

Sri Ramakrishna gave him the responsibility to awaken the India. After the death of Sri Ramakrishna in 1986, he went on to travel as penniless monk most of the time and covered almost the whole country. Some prominent places that are recorded to receive his footprints as traveller were Gazipur, Varanasi, Almora, Himalayas, Khetri, Aravalli Hills, Puna, Junagadh, Belgaum, Madras, Mysore, Malabar etc. During this period of travel he received the hospitality of various kings, highly established persons, as well as common people of his country, and often had to spend days in hunger without any food. By this, he experienced the inner soul of India and was in search of answer of his quest of the path for carrying out the responsibility given to him by his master. Finally, while in deep meditation in the rocks of Kanyakumari amidst the meeting point of Indian Ocean, Arabian Sea, and Bay of Bengal, he received the divine answer. He then went to the America and other western countries to spread and teach the message of Vedanta. After the initial hardship days in the completely unknown environment of the America, he received the grand success in Chicago Religious conference. The masses of British ruled India got this great success message and Indians as a whole became energized and started to believe in themselves.

Later on, Swami Vivekananda established Ramakrishna Math and Mission to bring the principles of Vedanta from the caves of Himalaya to the society and to realize the principle of “serving another is serving to God”. Indian freedom fighters and youths were highly inspired by the talks, lectures, and articles of Swami Vivekananda. He died in the year 1902 at the age of 39 only. His writings still inspires a lot many people and he is considered as the idol of youths.

If you read the Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda, you are bound to get much needed strength inside yourself. You can visit the birth place of Swami Vivekananda in Kolkata, Belur Math in Howrah, Dakshineswar temple etc. which are the some places associated with Swami Vivekananda. 

I would like to end this small article by three of his famous quotes: 

1. “Arise, Awake, and Stop Not till the Goal is reached” 

2. "Take up one idea. Make that one idea your life. Think of it. Dream of it, live on that idea. Let the brain, muscles, nerves, every part of your body be full of that idea, and just leave every other idea alone. This is the way to success". 

3. “Stand up, be bold, be strong. Take the whole responsibility on your shoulders, and know that you are the creator of your own destiny”.