Purnam

Purnam is a Sanskrit word meaning whole, complete, without lack. It’s a recognition of the absolute nature of the Universe. Self-Realization is a direct perception of this completeness as Self.

When I first approached Amma and asked her to accept me as a disciple (my second year in India), I recognized that the only way I could ever serve her was to have a complete realization of Self. My devotion to the Supreme Para-Shakti, as the Divine Principle was already quite intense, and I could see the trajectory of my journey. My journey was all about evolution, and not about being a success in the world. But yet I ended up in the world, while not really having any place in it.

This has been a huge challenge for me. Most of my life I’ve lived with extremely modest means, with absolutely no interest in securing a future. The challenge is when everyone else is looking for worldly success, and my Heart is yearning for absolute realization. Surrender became the most common day-to-day approach to this challenge, which has exposed every little perception of lack. I began to see my experiences of lack of money, security etc as only a perception, and not true. My inner life continued to reveal an abundance of light, bliss and Oneness with the Divine. It just hadn’t translated into the 3D world…yet.

As my lucidity of Self deepens and matures, I am recognizing that what I am headed for is Purnam- completeness without any need to have anything added. This is what the Purnam Mantra speaks of; the realization of that which is always complete, even when things are taken away, or when things are added. It cannot be less than complete. We are meant to know this about ourselves. This is the correct attitude regarding renunciation- we have no attachments to worldly things or people. We are the Universe and all its abundance. To know Purnam first will naturally bring about the experience of abundance as our Self.

It’s a challenge to describe this feeling, but when it shifts into it, you know it. And the real test comes when things are falling apart in your world, but it doesn’t really change anything. If anything, it only makes the living experience of Purnam deeper and more immediate.

To know Purnam isn’t an overnight awakening or understanding. It is a process of looking deeply at any perceptions of lack, or incompleteness. Since most of these are unconscious, time is a factor, and surrender reveals the subconscious. It takes a deep devotion to want to go beyond desires and attachments, to experience the Self as Purnam. It takes an acknowledgement that all desires are born out of the illusion of separation. It takes an open Heart filled with the Love of the Divine to know the Divine as what we are, as Purnam.