Developping inner Vision

Mere reading of spiritual texts is not enough. You may master all the commentaries and you may be able to argue and discuss with great scholars about these texts; but without attempting to practise what they teach, it is a waste of time. I never approve of book-learning; practice is what I evaluate. When you come out of the examination hall you know whether you will pass or not, is it not? For you can yourself judge whether you have answered well or not. So too in sadhana (spiritual effort) or in conduct or in practice, each of you can judge and ascertain the success or failure that is in store. The moon is reflected in a pot, provided it has water; so too the Lord can be clearly seen in your heart, provided you have the water of Love (Prema). When you don't see the Lord reflected in your heart, do not say that there is no Lord; it only means that there is no Love within you.

SSB

During the Hare Krishna experience we were reading verses of the Bhagavad Gity by heart and we read from the scriptures or the master that three verses are enough to be able to preach. 
If we don't practice, it is a waste of time.

The routine of cooking and preparing food for Krishna, was all about purity and constantly changing and taking showers and eating a lot. But there was still something permanent in it and divinity is not changing, otherwise, it is the mind and not divine.

That felt good, based on such principles and it felt okay, but the identity was Hare Krishnas, as soon that was gone, it was not there anymore.

I still went in direction to truth, I hoped to find inside with TM-meditation in the silence of the heart. I was looking for a way inside and that is why I began with TM to be still in a spiritual identity.

When we left the Hare Krishnas that identity was lost and it was not attractive, whatever the attraction. It felt like too much problems left, whatever that was, money problems and other problems.  

The attraction was gone, but because of the Hare Krishnas, as long as we lived in that identity everything seemed okay, no differences, we were part of it. We were just part of the momevemt, whatever we did. But as soon as we left another side came up, the mind reality in society or the field, if there was no proper profession it was just lick attracting lots of problems, whatever that was. To not lose the spiritual identity I went on with TM.

It was not attractive also to just be part of that society, in a fact, we liked that Hare Krishna environment, only not the cooking and eating and the constantly taking showers.

With the Hare Krishnas we learnt three Bhagavad Gita verses by heart and they said it was enough to be able to preach.

If we go into a mind conclusion, it is not aware of the importance of spiritual scripures, so someone who is with the Hare Krishna would never preach without a verse from the Gita.

If we want to know right from wrong or good from bad, we have to resort to scriputres and we have to listen, what means to think it over, accept truth and see that in our own life, otherwise, we cannot understand it.

If that question about the serpant in the dream came up, you we get together with someone else to a mind conclusion, not knowing the difference between inner view and dream only.

If we listen to his words and think it over we have to accept truth and that truth cannot be in the mind, otherwise, it is not true.

Only if we look at the objective world, body, mind, thoughts as well, in the light of the inner vision and our insights we can see nature and the relative, created objects in the inner view and that way attachment will slide away. 
It is important to not get to wrong conclusions and those conclusions are in the mind and if we don't resort to scriputres to know the difference from good and bad, we get to wrong conclusions.   

A wrong conclusion is not based on wisdom, but on the mind only.

The snake is an insight that is the result of some spiritual direction and we cannot conclude on the mind and body level, we are not understanding the difference between insight and going in a spiritual direction and the body. 
We have to get aware of the difference, the body  is but an instrument an inert and in the body is consciousness, being-awareness-bliss.

We have to resort to scriptures if we want to know the difference between good and bad, it always is bad if it is only a mind conclusion. 

If we just read it and think we understand, it is mind and therefore, no right conclusion. If we listen and know that it is the mind getting to wrong conclusions, we think it over to absorb the truth and to see it in our own life helps to understand that truth in the light of our own experience. Thus the inner vision is growing and if we are able to see nature and all created objects out of that inner vision, attachment will slide away.

That is the meaning of not just reading but practicing, not just learning by heart, but integrating it in our life to get that inner view based on insights. It has to do with the expansion of consciousness. 
And we talk about that level and an 'insight' and not just a dream and understanding the insights leads to self-realization. 

People suffer because they have all kinds of unreasonable desires and they pine to fulfill them and they fail. They attach too much value to the objective world. It is only when attachment increases that you suffer pain and grief. If you look upon Nature and all created objects with the insight derived from the Inner Vision, then attachment will slide away, though effort will remain; you will also see everything much clearer and with a glow suffused with Divinity and splendor. Close your external eyes and open your inner eyes - What a grand picture of essential unity you get? Attachment to Nature has limits, but the attachment you develop to the Lord when your inner eye opens, has no limit. Enjoy that reality, not this false picture.