Fowai

Full or Empty?

Vibha — Wed, 09 May 2012 16:50:58 +0000

Surge 89

Full or Empty?

Thich Nhat Hanh, the well-known Buddhist teacher, comments1 on the famous Heart Sutras (Prajna-Paramita) and says a sheet of paper contains everything in the universe in it, and yet, according to the revelations of the Bodhisattva Avalokita, it is empty! Removing the apparent contradiction, the author clarifies that ‘empty’ means here, ‘empty of a separate self.’ When we hold a cup of water and ask somebody, “Is this an empty cup?” we get the answer, “No, the cup is filled with water.” When we throw away all the water and ask the same question, we are told, “Yes, it is empty.” The cup is empty of water. In that sense, when we deeply examine this universe or, for that matter, ourselves, we find there is nowhere a ‘separate self’. The ego is always a creation of thought. Deep inquiry – here and now – dispels the false ahankara.

We have lungs, heart, kidneys, stomach and blood in our bodies but none of these can exist independently. They can only coexist. In like manner, the entire universe is filled with things which are interdependent. Hanh coins a new verb – inter-be – in his book and says2, “Lungs and blood inter-are.” We tend to forget the interdependence of things and beings, and get concerned with ‘me and mine’. The illusion is hard to penetrate for the one who has to question is also a part of the illusion. In the famous illustration of the ‘snake upon the rope,’ both the illusory snake and the factual rope are outside us. The onlooker has to throw a beam of light upon the spot of confusion. Here, however, in the context of the illusory ‘I’, the onlooker is not separate from the illusion. She asks, “Why am I miserable?” and looks for a cause outside. She does not suspect that the ‘I’ which is miserable is itself of questionable credentials.

Self-knowledge (atma-bodha) therefore is different from all knowledge. In any other knowledge, the knower and the known are separate. In Self-knowledge, the knower disappears the very instant knowledge takes place. There is only knowing (observation) without a knower (observer). “Can the Self be two-fold? Can there be one Self that knows, and a second Self that is known?” asks3 Shri Ramana Maharshi in one of his works. This scenario seems mystical where there is no knower. We may think such experiences could happen at some point of meditation but it is not practical when we have to work in daily life. We generally put meditation into a separate compartment – in time (like very early morning) and space (like the special room or a cave in the Himalayas). True meditation is not a matter of the right time and the right place. It is rather dependent on the intensity of inquiry and on the maturity of perception. Steer clear of wrong habits of thinking. Give up false beliefs. See life with very fresh eyes. Meditation happens.

The society has, with our full cooperation, pumped ideas into our head. “We are from a prestigious family. We are from a superior religion. We are very good in heart (though we have made 108 mistakes in our life). We must be respected (and it does not matter if others are not.) etc.” These ideas create the false, separate self. As these ideas arise, we must gaze at them with no bias. When my memory says I am superior, I must ask, am I? When it suggests I am worthless, I must ask, am I? This watchful state is the best ‘time and place’ (desha-kaala).

Let us gather our energy and bust this illusion central to our life of conflict and misery. Is there anything more important?

Swami Chidananda
Varanasi,
Wednesday, May 9, 2012

End Notes:
1 The Heart of Understanding, published by Full Circle, New Delhi – page 5.
2 ibid page 10.
3 “drig-drishya-bhedat kim ayam dvidhatma?” – Saddarshanam, verse 35mpty

The Trap of the Seen

Vibha — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 12:03:05 +0000

Surge 88

The Trap of the Seen

It has always been a problem for the human mind to encounter the dazzling names and forms1 of this created universe and yet remain unmoved. The world of the ‘seen’ is just too tempting to remain at peace. “Oh it is beautiful,” is followed in no time by, “Well, I want it”. All material pursuits are basically going after possessions possible in this visible world, which our mind labels as objects of desire. Our ego is attached to these objects. No wonder somebody expanded the three letters that make the word EGO as – Earth Guide Only2. It cannot guide us towards the heavens, the divine.
The extrovert mind is also fascinated by numbers. It feels happy to imagine, “Maximum customers buy my product; my house is the biggest; my car is the best; the largest number want to read my book,” and so on. M K Gandhi wrote:
Strength of numbers
is the delight of the timid.
The valiant in spirit
glory in fighting alone3.
The unseen is called the spirit. “Unseen am I to most people, for the delusory power of maya veils them. People who are charmed by this creation do not know me, for I am unborn and changeless4.” The words of Shri Krishna drive home the point. Whether you are spiritual in the usual sense or not, this distinction between the seen and the unseen can be very relevant to you. You are creative when your ego is silent. You take a leap in your understanding when your attachments to the seen subside. The hidden courage in you expresses when you do not care for quantity but go for quality. In the language of philosophers, there is an invisible source of everything in our material world. Reconnect to that source and regain great powers of that source. Invite the ego, and you ensure separation from your source5.
“Particles themselves are not responsible for their own creation6,” observes modern quantum physics. “That which is seen hath not come from that which doth appear7,” observed Saint Paul, one of the authors of the New Testament. Physicists and mystics thus appeal to us together to explore hidden possibilities within us, in our life filled with mysteries. A glimpse of this truth frees us from despair, gives us new hope and even supplies energy to surge forth in the field chosen by our heart.
The Creation is no doubt wonderful. As a field of infinite possibilities, it is whole (poorna) in itself. The Source is magnificent too. As the fountain of infinite possibilities, it too is whole (poorna) in its own right. Take the whole out of the whole (or add the whole to the whole), the whole alone remains. Division, separation and misery accompany the part, created by ego. Oneness, Aloneness and bliss are experienced when we reconnect to the Source.
Swami Chidananda
Varanasi,
Monday, April 16, 2012
End Notes:
1 naama-roopa, names and forms, implying all that is seen or perceived.
2 Wisdom of the Ages, Wayne Dyer, published by Thorsons, London – page 216
3 ibid page 215
4 Bhagavad-Geeta 7.25
5 Wisdom of the Ages, page 217
6, 7 Quoted by Dyer in his book referred to above, page 215

Peace and Freedom

Vibha — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 13:13:22 +0000

Peace and Freedom

Swami Chidananda

“Awareness in first place is not a thought. Awareness is something where thought in its entirety is noticed, is exposed, the networ of thoughts stands revealed in the light of awareness.”

Strangely however, all of us are not aware of the entirety of our thinking. In our thinking a division takes place and one of the most important and really the most trouble-some division is the sense of ‘I’. Thoughts construct this sense of I, which you and I perceive, you and I experience in the form of various conclusions about our worth, our value. These self judgments are bundles of thoughts. When I say we operate in thoughts, the classical Vedanta has always said, we identify with these particular fragments of thought and say ‘this is me’ and then as that me or as that particular identity we have an outlook towards life.

Barriers to Awareness

Division –>sense of ‘I’.
Constructed by thoughts we perceive, conclude –> self judgment. Vedanta says, we identify with our judgmental thoughts and develop an outlook
Division –>sense of ‘I’.
Constructed by thoughts we perceive, conclude –>self judgment.
Vedanta says, we identify with our judgmental thoughts and develop an outlook towards life –>’This is Me’

Who is me really? Who am I actually?

Am I what the bundle of thoughts at that part of time is presenting me as? Or
Am I something different?

This has been a question in the Vedanta, in all these self inquiry literature, in order that we come out of this self imposed limitation, in order that we get out of this prison of thoughts which portrays us as so and so; such and such in the light of some memories, in the light of some piece of information or pieces of information. We need to exercise Attention. We need to be Aware of the entire mind. If I walk up, come to the middle of the hall, see the half of the hall and don’t see the half of the hall which is behind me, there is fragmentation. In contrast if I am aware of the whole hall, I understand the full expanse of the hall. It may be a different situation.

Analogy does not go very far but there is certainly being aware of whole of our mind and that is the meaning of Awareness and Attention. And in that Awareness a whole lot of supporting thoughts, justifying thoughts, a whole lot of background values, whole lot of factors that generally lie behind our joy and sorrow, our fear and insecurity get exposed. These hidden factors’ being exposed makes all the difference. That is when in that very getting exposed, a deep transformation takes place. For what we thought was necessary now becomes evidently unnecessary. What we are not sensitive to and therefore ignored becomes evident.

To explore Who am I?

Need to exercise attention, be aware of the entirety of the mind.
Then the hidden factors àsupporting/justifying thoughts, background values, thoughts of joy, happiness, fear, insecurity get exposed, –>awakening certain sensitivity.
Necessary becomes evidently Unnecessary, what we are not sensitive to, therefore ignored becomes evident –>awakens

forgiveness & compassion.

True forgiveness and compassion will be possible when certain sensitivity is awakened in us. Unless we awaken the hidden sensitivity and thereby see the pain of another person, understand the limitation of another person we cannot forgive, we cannot be compassionate.

So this very comprehensive, all inclusive Awareness in which on one hand – false stand points, false positions that we take fall away and right perception flowers, is of great value. Living in total awareness is not fragmented awareness. That is no awareness at all.

Can we be free: Peace and Freedom is what everyone wants. Alas! We conceive freedom in a limited fashion though. All the time we are aiming at economic freedom, political freedom, we have the expression ‘freedom fighters’ and so many words come up. Today everybody wants space. My space – ‘don’t encroach upon my space’ physical space, psychological space, emotional space, intellectual space, many kinds of space and then there is ‘my space, my emotional, my physical, my….etc. we have always conceived of freedom, peace. Every young boy or girl dreams of standing on his or her own legs.

Two people were going in a crowded city bus of Mumbai. A young man and an old man. They were standing in between. The old man says to the young man, ‘when will you stand on your own feet?’ and the young man says, ‘what do you mean? It’s already three years I got my job and I am earning.’ The old man said, ‘but right now you are standing on my feet, physically.’

So you and I have this idea of standing on one’s own feet. To have enough money, to get a good fat pay cheque, to have a big house, to have our own vehicle, many many things in many ways. The point is in countless ways all of conceive freedom, peace.

However, Masters like Ramana Maharshi have said,

‘There is only one freedom. If you are bound by anything, it is only by one factor. You are your bondage and you can be your liberation.’

In one of the verse of ‘Saddarshanam’ he says,

‘When we have the self operating in us, the self which itself is a construction of thoughts and then it sustains itself and survives in the medium of a number of thoughts which bring insecurity, jealousy, regrets—thoughts that bring sorrow. The self is the very base of whole lot of things which are all thoughts.’

Ramana Maharshi ruthlessly or compassionately says,

‘When the self is in operation you are bound, when self is absent you are free.’

Therefore to inquire into the nature of the self, the ‘I’, the sad I, the jealous I, we generally inquire into the sadness, into the jealousy, into the so called factors out there. ‘I am jealous of him, I shouldn’t be.’ Attention is on him what he did, what he did not do. There is someone of whom I am jealous than there is jealousy and then there is ‘I am jealous’. This ‘I’ is taken for granted, ‘I’ is considered more a convenience in language and it’s considered as non-issue but in this spiritual discussion it is the main issue and Ramana Maharshiji says,

‘Don’t worry about him, of whom you are jealous, don’t worry about all these details – what are the reasons? how it began?, how it got further enhanced by some other factors? Don’t go into those peripheral issues, go to this very self, it is the jealous self in this example. Some other time it is a sad self, that is ME. This ME inquire and in that inquiry it goes away. When the self goes away, it is total freedom, total victory.’

He calls it sarvajaya complete victory.

All our problems from a spiritual perspective are of the form of ‘I’. Just as- if my foot is injured and I step on the carpet, it pains. I step on marble it pains and you say let me try to help you, you hold my hand. As soon as you hold it, it pains. In my ignorance and immaturity, I would say, ‘this carpet, this marble and your hand all are terrible, they all are sources of pain’ but where is the pain actually? My foot has an injury.

Very much so when you and I are with wounded ego, everything seems to hurt us. Someone smiles at us, we are suspicious. Another person does not smile at us, we are hurt. To smile is a problem, not to smile is another problem. So here is the wounded self, the hurt self, the disturbed self and self in all of us is like that only. Ramana Maharshiji would say, ‘this self has to be having wound and hurt and pride etc. if these are not there then there is no self.’ But can we truly be free of the self? This looks rather impossible in first analysis. We think, ‘Without ego, that is impossible’. But that is where these Masters really surprise us saying, ‘it is possible, in pure Attention, in pure Awareness, there is no room for self to rise.’

”Peace and Freedom is truly accomplished when this inner enemy of ours – the thought created fear, the thought created insecurity,inferiority etc. is undone. That is Peace and that is Freedom.”

In Bhagavad Gita you have words like paraashaanti or even when Sri Krishna uses the word shaanti which means peace, He is talking of true peace. Not the peace of sleep where the mind is stilled, quietened for a while. It will rise again and it has all its likes and dislikes. Not the peace that we derive out of an escape into some pleasure or music. Not the peace that is caused by someone praising us and temporarily there is good picture of who I am. But true peace is when self-centre, the self which is the center in us is erased. For example in Bhagavad Gita chapter II stithaprajna portion—the person of equanimity. Sri Krishna says,

vihaayakaamaan yah sarvaan pumaamshcarati nisprhah nirmamo nirahamkaarah sashaantimadhi gacchati||

Let us just take a part of the above verse: nirahamkaarh shaantim adhigacchati three words which say ‘One who has no self, ego, attains peace.’ This is what all have said that is peace, that is freedom.

You sometimes have a very interesting situation, a tyrant imprisons some intellectual or a thinker saying, ‘he is dangerous to the state’ and the tyrant gets into more and more complications politically. He is the head of the whole country or state. Even we could be like that in a given situation. Outwardly we hold power, we have imprisoned someone and we have power to deny even food and air to that person. He is imprisoned, I am free but psychologically we find I am imprisoned. I cannot sleep, I am riding on a tiger I am always afraid what next. And this man in the prison is composing poems. We hear numerous examples – Acharya Vinoba Bhave wrote and gave wonderful talks on Bhagavad Gita. It is a all time classic and he delivered the talk in his imprisonment.

So we are thus examining psychological realm which is what actually matters. The physical realm has a certain place but what truly matters is the psychological realm. Within us, do we feel free or within us do we feel always afraid. ‘I cannot be myself with him/her/them, always hiding something, guarding something, keeping several layers, files, accounts, lacking transparency’

In this psychological realm let us examine how Peace and Freedom can be discovered in Awareness. What happens moment to moment in our mind as we meet with situations.

Somebody insults me that is the stimulus. If I am fully aware, then I listen to those words, I see what they mean and I then have to decide what to say, what to do. I have to; there is no question of just being aware. Don’t stand like a furniture or vegetable. God forbid there is an earthquake at this moment. Do you think all of us have to watch. That is not watching. Suddenly if things start shaking and we have almost sixth sense of earthquakes. So what do we do? Every one of us, go out and stand below the doorframes and all of us know what has to be done. But you see, as we do what needs to be done and as we say. what needs to be said, there could be a second dimension in the mind of any of us -‘my God, where I go why such things happen’ and many such thoughts. These are called associated thoughts, applied or secondary thoughts. Where the ‘I’ came, where I am depicting myself as an unfortunate person. I am judging myself, labeling myself and sometimes I could be so attached to it that if one of you say, ‘don’t think like that’ I may get angry with you.

So I have sadness that I am unfortunate, which is my judgment. Then I have anger with you. A whole lot of thoughts drawing from memory. And thus along with, here is the earthquake and I need to run out. These are all functional thoughts and fear of something falling on my head and crushing me. Fear is an emotion, this is also an emotion rooted in present and it is not memory related fear. I am mortally afraid. But suppose I have a thought, ‘in all earlier situations many terrible things had happened, even when I went to buy a cinema ticket when my turn came they said ‘houseful!’ it looks that others will go out safely but when I’ll go, it will hit’ this is rooted in memory. ‘I’ ‘they’, ‘they are fortunate, I am unfortunate, they are likely to get free, I am not likely’……See this division of ‘they’ and ‘I’ is utterly unwarranted.

In bright Awareness, in bright Alertness, there will be no room for the construction of this… ‘unfortunate I’ or ‘fortunate I’ ‘the good I’ ‘the bad I’ —there is no ‘I’ in fact though I am running, my thoughts do not build an I. As I drink water I am drinking water, there is functionality, there is action, there is tasting, if the water is sweet or sour, I know also but there is no thought of who I am in qualification, age or name etc. because it is not warranted. The glass of water does not ask me, ‘tell thou, who art thou?’ In the same way I could rush out of this hall.

How do we manage insult?

· Be aware of the insulting words.

· Habitual thoughts which arise, do not feed them.

· Alert! Energy is saved, lot of space created, flexibility is available to us.

· You feel light mentally with more options à Handle the situation in some ingenious way.

Meet an event, in full awareness of the present

In that way can you manage insult? When someone insults you, be aware of insulting words and if by sheer momentum or habit, some thoughts come—‘this is the seventh time he is doing this to me’ be aware of it but don’t feed it. If you are Aware, if you are Alert, you will not feed. And that thought which rose, drawing from memory, will subside. Because I am not here to build a file, here she is insulting me and I notice it. In the very first analysis of whole thing, moment, there are no unnecessary thoughts. The whole lot of mechanical eruption or rising of thoughts does not take place, there is lot of energy saved, lot of space created and lot of flexibility becomes available to me. In that space, in that flexibility, in that room I can handle this insult in some ingenious way. I can say thank you, not conforming to some example of somebody thanking someone who insulted that is different. Out of the space you discover, you feel light. When you feel light, you lave lot of options. When you feel heavy and pulled down, you cannot have many options. Physically also, if I am stuck to this chair than I cannot move. Whereas otherwise I can move and can do many things.

So mentally also I have lot of options, as I live in this Awareness. See the beauty of meeting with an event, in full Awareness of present. Not to be carried away by memory, not to project that very memory into future. As I live in Attention, in Awareness, in the present moment, which is not a decision, which is not my resolve but which is the way of natural being, I stay in certain simplicity. It’s very different from resolving- ‘I shall stay in present’. Then the thought has come, can you be Aware without deciding to be Aware? Can you drink a glass of water without having to say three times, ‘I shall drink, I shall drink, I shall definitely drink’ and you drink. Are those three sentences necessary? But in meeting with praise and in meeting with insult, I would maintain that in meeting with situation in Awareness you don’t have to decide to be Aware. You can be Aware, you are Aware and that is your nature.

In the awareness memories are not encouraged. Space is generated and the immediate benefit is that we are interested in it. ‘Oh, I can handle the insult better.’ But more than just the immediate benefit there comes about the inner change. The self, the ego, the bundle of thoughts, depicting oneself as good or bad, the picture, I am unfortunate, I am bad and I hate to be in his company etc. when they go away. This ‘I’ itself goes away. There is no ‘I’. It is not just in mathematics but in this philosophy, in this self inquiry too this ‘I’ is only imaginary.

Guilt or shame are creation of thought when thought is limited. In full awareness of our life, of our thoughts, we realize I should pass but there will be no negative energy. Every one of us really speaking is Okay. Everyone is fine Now. All of us think, I will become fine one day. You are fine Now. You are fine as you are. Rest of it is certain particularities, just as in the plant world, different plant have different nature, some are tall, some are short, etc. we don’t judge this is bad tree, that is good tree. We enjoy variety.

But here we tend to say, ‘everybody should be like this’. When British conquered various countries, they tried to make everyone live like Englishman.

So this self acceptance, seeing ourselves fully, leads to self acceptance. Seeing ourselves only partly, only academics, only sports, is fragment. To see whole of life, sends away all your shame, guilt etc. of course, it doesn’t make you licentious, shameless or irresponsible. Rather it gives you a mature outlook and you put things in their proper places and without negative energy you get going. This ‘I am bad’ ‘I’ ‘I’ ‘I’; because of this ‘I’ is self, ego. This self is imaginary only.

”I is only imaginary. In pure Attention, pure Awareness, the ‘I’ goes

away and that is total freedom”

We can see a situation and there is full awareness and only functional thought which includes emotions rooted in present. Not only the skills and not only the left brain oriented stuff and relevant memories, absolutely fact based projections. But for one pound of things rooted in present, in fact there are hundreds of pounds of that this mind creates, which is rooted in figments of memory. Memory is always figments, no one can remember everything at once, a piece comes here, a piece comes there. So if there is Awareness, there is no ‘I’ there is only right emotion, right action and right going ahead.

One says there may be no ‘I’, granted but will not the ‘I’ rise afterwards? Will there be no self rejection or sense of failure later on? See we are already concerned about the future, we are so concerned, so panicky almost about future. This is where we say, the self or the ego is such a movement of the mind which has its own lobby, its own supports. And to notice that, this is one more good old habit of thinking.

Suppose there is an insight. This ‘I’ is to think I am low or I am high, this is only a mechanical activity of the mind. And then comes the thought, ‘how will I keep this insight?’ Look at that thought, stare at that thought sternly. Don’t answer that thought because that thought ‘how will I sustain?’ If you honour that thought, if you give validity to that thought then you are trapped. You stare at it and look at it as another mechanical event. That thought, how will I sustain this freedom tomorrow? Is rooted in a same ailment, as would arouse the ego itself. It is another thief.

All we need to do is, handle the present moment as though that is the only moment. There may be tomorrow or there may not be tomorrow. There is no tomorrow. There never was yesterday, there never will be tomorrow, this is the only moment. This is not poetry. This tomorrow, this yesterday etc. in the light of true knowledge is all part of a fiction. It’s like a back ground and fore ground of a video game. When we are playing a video game it is all real. Whole thing is a game, there is no foreground, there is no background, it is a screen, flat screen. On the flat screen there is the appearance of past and future. In pretty much the same way, tomorrow and yesterday are given certain validity and it is possible for you to be above this. 1.3.2012

”An enlightened soul plays the same rules of the game as you and I dobut yet knows clearly – On one hand there is no future, there is nopast, present alone is true and like the other side of the same coinwithout having to derive something more or prove something more.”

Like in mathematics, if you know the theorem, the corollaries arealready proved, you may have to discover it.

In the same way Awareness is the only true theorem in life.

o Corollary 1. Past and future are false.

o Corollary 2. The self is false.

Hurt is false, pride is false are all corollaries.

To see that the self is false is living in total Peace, total Freedom.You don’t bind yourself, situation may happen, may be according to thepredetermined pattern or by praarabdha as the word goes.

Even Christ was crucified, Ramakrishna and Ramana had cancer. Krishnamurti too had pancreatic cancer and suffered quite a bit before breathing his last breath. There is pain, there is the experience of the pain but for one pound of pain you and I generate hundreds of pounds of psychological suffering. ‘I wish I would have got it 10 years later’ – thinking, comparing with someone. Number of forms of thought created suffering. Pain comes and pain goes whereas we sustain suffering through thought.

Central to this whole movement of varieties of thoughts, is the self. Just as if I have a marker pen, I can write all sorts of things on the white board—good things, bad things, poems, prose etc. and you come and take away my marker pen itself, then nothing can be written. When there is no self, no marker pen the white board, if it is fresh clean, remains clean. In Awareness the board gets cleaned and also remains clean.

Only when there is the self, there is winning and there is losing, there is moral eminence and there is moral degradation, there is success and there is failure, varieties of things happen.

Nisargdutta Maharaj was asked, ‘What is the difference between your world and our world?’ And his answer was, ‘Lot of things happen in your world, nothing happens in my world.’ In some other place he has replied ‘In your world nothing happens, in my world lot of things happen.’ Even in our Upanishad we find contradictory statements. There the meaning is, there is so much of freedom, there is so much of divine experience and in the egoistic world there is so much constrain, so much of lack of freedom. So in that sense nothing is possible, you cannot do anything. Every moment you say, ‘I want to do but what will my children think and what will society think’ and so you are constraint so you cannot do.

Whereas the enlightened one is totally free. Swami Chinmayananda made very strange statement about freedom, “Not to do what you feel like doing is freedom.” Generally we have simple definition of freedom—‘freedom is being able to do what you want to do’ and he said something opposite. What he meant was that we have these instincts, impulses, just mechanical urges and he said not to go by those urges. Rather give thought to it and see whether it is good or bad and then doing what is truly good, is the hall mark of freedom. If the people went about doing whatever they felt like doing, that is not freedom. That is licentiousness. That would be a chaotic situation, in that sense he said it.

In conclusion

· In self inquiry it is not a matter of doing or not doing at all. It is a matter of being fully aware of day to day activities.

· Do’s and don’ts are part of life. If do’s and don’ts are given total sanctity, total sacredness and do’s and don’ts are given such a position, that this is all there is to life, then there will be a problem. If dos and don’ts are appreciated in their proper context then in that appreciation deeper insights could be facilitated.

· In other words, how karma kaandi-s said, karma alone, action alone is everything in life and someone like Adi Shankara showed that there is something beyond karma but within the context of karma- activity necessarily there will be do’s and don’ts.

· Inner freedom is a matter of undoing the psychological conflict, psychological division, psychological comparison which generates disharmony in us. In coming to a psychological integration one experiences freedom. Think of the tyrant who imprisoned a pious man, the pious man in the prison is also at peace, though he knows and wishes to be free but it doesn’t rub on him all day and night. He very much wishes to be free, there is no denying of it but his mind has that purity, that simplicity that he goes on composing a poem or Acharya Vinoba Bhave while giving a Gita discourse on a Sunday morning to fellow prisoners is completely free from the thought that he is in prison.

· It is one thing to be in prison and another is the thought that I am in prison. Vinoba was free from the thought that I am in prison. Most of you here are householders. I would say, it is one thing to be family person but quite another to carry thoughts all the time, ‘I am a family person and it is difficult’ like a mantra. This is lack of Attention.

· In our mind there are lots of things mechanically happening and that is where freedom is denied. These mechanical patterns go away in the heat, in the light of Awareness and there is tremendous amount of freedom natural to us waiting to be discovered. So in the tyrant’s example, Saddam Hussain atrociously killed people and buried them. What is the spiritual solution for this act of Saddam or a tyrant and the dictator which is present in our heart too? Can a tyrant accept himself as he is?

· Is it possible for us to say to him, ‘you are fine now!’ Yes, I would say

That. I would stand by the spiritual insights of these great seers. How does it work? If even the worst criminal, observes and is aware of whole thing and if he comes to complete terms with it, in that coming to terms with situation completely, he frees himself from false prestige. He is ready to say, ‘I did all these things, this is me and I am sincerely sorry for all that.’ In that complete honesty, not a political stunt like advisor asking him to do so that he can be forgiven. Not that but totally he feels that he lived a wrong life and he completely confesses, admits, not to the whole world but concerned people that depends on situation. In that complete acceptance and complete opening up, Saddam can get enlightenment.

Masterspeak

“Enlightenment is coming to terms with yourself as you are, completely. Which is possible in thorough Attention, through Awareness and there is no ‘I’ at all there. That is complete surrender.

Absence of the false self. The lack of freedom is when, thanks to thoughts and not because of external factors, we live in a certain sense of being shrunk, a certain constraint inner atmosphere comes about in us, purely created by thoughts.

While we all are active and shall remain active in making the world a better place that of course goes on. The crux of the issue here in the matter of Peace and Freedom is the self created, thought created bondage.

Awareness would do to thoughts.

”Peace and Freedom is truly accomplished when this inner enemy of

ours – the thought created fear, the thought created insecurity,

inferiority etc. is undone. That is Peace and that is Freedom.”

vihaayakaamaan yah sarvaan pumaamshcarati nisprhah nirmamo nirahamkaarah sashaantimadhi gacchati||

In this psychological realm let us examine how Peace and Freedom can be discovered in Awareness. What happens moment to moment in our mind as we meet with situations.

How do we manage insult?

· Be aware of the insulting words.

· Habitual thoughts which arise, do not feed them.

· Alert! Energy is saved, lot of space created, flexibility is available to us.

· You feel light mentally with more options à Handle the situation in some ingenious way.

Meet an event, in full awareness of the present

But here we tend to say, ‘everybody should be like this’. When British conquered various countries, they tried to make everyone live like Englishman.

”I is only imaginary. In pure Attention, pure Awareness, the ‘I’ goes

away and that is total freedom”

”An enlightened soul plays the same rules of the game as you and I do

but yet knows clearly – On one hand there is no future, there is no

past, present alone is true and like the other side of the same coin

without having to derive something more or prove something more.”

Like in mathematics, if you know the theorem, the corollaries are

already proved, you may have to discover it.

In the same way Awareness is the only true theorem in life.

o Corollary 1. Past and future are false.

o Corollary 2. The self is false.

Hurt is false, pride is false are all corollaries.

To see that the self is false is living in total Peace, total Freedom. You

don’t bind yourself, situation may happen, may be according to the

predetermined pattern or by praarabdha as the word goes.

Only when there is the self, there is winning and there is losing, there is moral eminence and there is moral degradation, there is success and there is failure, varieties of things happen.

In conclusion

In self inquiry it is not a matter of doing or not doing at all. It is a matter of being fully aware of day to day activities.

Do’s and don’ts are part of life. If do’s and don’ts are given total sanctity, total sacredness and do’s and don’ts are given such a position, that this is all there is to life, then there will be a problem. If dos and don’ts are appreciated in their proper context then in that appreciation deeper insights could be facilitated.

In other words, how karma kaandi-s said, karma alone, action alone is everything in life and someone like Adi Shankara showed that there is something beyond karma but within the context of karma- activity necessarily there will be do’s and don’ts.

Inner freedom is a matter of undoing the psychological conflict, psychological division, psychological comparison which generates disharmony in us. In coming to a psychological integration one experiences freedom. Think of the tyrant who imprisoned a pious man, the pious man in the prison is also at peace, though he knows and wishes to be free but it doesn’t rub on him all day and night. He very much wishes to be free, there is no denying of it but his mind has that purity, that simplicity that he goes on composing a poem or Acharya Vinoba Bhave while giving a Gita discourse on a Sunday morning to fellow prisoners is completely free from the thought that he is in prison.

It is one thing to be in prison and another is the thought that I am in prison. Vinoba was free from the thought that I am in prison. Most of you here are householders. I would say, it is one thing to be family person but quite another to carry thoughts all the time, ‘I am a family person and it is difficult’ like a mantra. This is lack of Attention.

In our mind there are lots of things mechanically happening and that is where freedom is denied. These mechanical patterns go away in the heat, in the light of Awareness and there is tremendous amount of freedom natural to us waiting to be discovered. So in the tyrant’s example, Saddam Hussain atrociously killed people and buried them. What is the spiritual solution for this act of Saddam or a tyrant and the dictator which is present in our heart too? Can a tyrant accept himself as he is?

Is it possible for us to say to him, ‘you are fine now!’ Yes, I would say

Masterspeak

“Enlightenment is coming to terms with yourself as you are, completely. Which is possible in thorough Attention, through Awareness and there is no ‘I’ at all there. That is complete surrender.

That thought is a pattern, it is mechanical process and the ending of that mechanical process is in Awareness, which does not suppress thoughts but which sees the entire structure of thoughts. In seeing the entire structure of thoughts, thoughts as though become ashamed and subside away. Thoughts will have shame and subside away. That is what Awareness would do to thoughts.

RISING TO RAMA CONSCIOUSNESS

Vibha — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 11:08:51 +0000

Surge 87

RISING TO RAMA CONSCIOUSNESS

People are found to be living in conflict, in this world, irrespective of their chosen way of living. The majority who believe in pursuing pleasure are constantly chasing the mirage of fulfillment. They find it is wild goose chase, leaving them tired at the end. Many questions haunt them, “Where did we go wrong, if at all we did?” or “Would we have been happy if such and such thing had not happened in the year 2002?” A large number among them continue to believe that objects of the world can give them lasting happiness, provided certain conditions exist. They do not see that those conditions are just not possible. They are indeed in the grip of ‘moha,’ the worldly delusion. Happiness comes from outside, is the summary of their misunderstanding.

There is a minority, not too small in numbers, who think they are religious. They repeat statements from scriptures and they are always going through a struggle – of combating their very demanding senses. They try to deny pleasure to their eyes, palate and other organs of perception (indriyas). This denial is mostly a failure and these people often end up as hypocrites. They are penny-wise but pound-foolish. They save a little energy by their less indulgent lifestyle but lose much more through their inner conflict and unrest.

The senses laugh at all of us. We let them indulge, we are in sorrow in one way. We suppress them, we suffer in another way. Merrymaking (bhoga) is one face of delusion (moha) and immature control (viveka-rahita-samyama) is its second face. We are miserable either way.

The great saint Sadashiva Brahmendra praises Sri Rama in his well-known poem, khelati mama hridaye sri Ramah, “You help us go beyond the ocean of moha1.” Rama represents the bliss of clear understanding, where there is neither indulgence nor suppression. When we realize Him, we are not in the field of attraction or repulsion2. It is a quantum leap, transcendence. We do not strive to attain peace here. We are at peace. Sita, of the nature of peace, is by Rama’s side3. We rise to a different plane. The scriptures refer to it sometimes as ‘residing in the inner space of dahara4’. We must inquire into our usual approach in sadhana (spiritual practice), where we employ a means (sadhana) to arrive at an end (sadhya). This special space or the higher plane is marked by the absence of the division of the means and the end.

Therefore it is said, “Be still.” The advice again is, “Awareness is the way to awareness.” A Zen greeting card said, “There is no way to peace. Peace is the way.” Maharshi Ramana remarks5 that the way to remember (or think of) the Supreme is simply to stay in it. Be in it and be it. Let thought subside. Let all activities of the mind, rising from its (limitless store of) memories, cease. All duality (dvaita) is created by the mind (manah-kalpita). Can we stay away from this old habit of remembering something, and then taking a position of being the desirer. Employing thought, I become the desirer; something becomes the object desired. I become the seeker; something is sought. The ego is a creation of (psychological) memory. {To remember the route to a friend’s house is functional memory. To remember how he had insulted me once, and to let this memory go further to build an image of mine, is psychological memory.} When we discard psychological memory and stay with just the functional mind, we are like the mythological swan (hamsa) that can separate milk from water.

The saint pays a tribute to his guru, calling him the Supreme Swan6, and remarks that we realize (and become one with) Sri Rama whose nature is Existence, Awareness and Bliss7. When we shed our ego, not by indulgence or suppression, but through right understanding and intense awareness, Lord Sri Rama plays in the field of our hearts.

Swami Chidananda

Varanasi, April 2, 2012

End Notes:

1 moha-maharnava-tarana-kari

2 raga-dvesha-mukhasura-mari

3 shanti-videha-suta-sahachari

4 dahara-ayodhya-nagara-vihari

5 tasya smritis-tatra dridhaiva nistha (Saddarshanam verse 1)

6 parama-hamsa-samrajya-uddhari

7 satya-jnana-ananda-shariri

Are you a Person?

Vibha — Wed, 21 Mar 2012 07:23:23 +0000

Surge 86

Are you a Person?

Swami Chidananda

In stillness, pure consciousness, there is nobody. When thoughts arise and memories begin their play, there is ‘the person’ that you take yourself to be. When the person comes in the play, your mind splits. There are the divisions – positive and negative, pleasure and pain and so on. The reflex comes up – to be somebody. In the medium of thoughts, there arises the relationship between personality and personality. There is an object-to-object relationship, and this object – the ‘me’ created by your thoughts – lives for security, recognition. It feels the need to be loved. It asks, demands and suffers conflict.

When the body-mind wakes up in the morning, it is memory that wakes up. Fear, anxiety, reactions and many other residues wake up. There is sensation of the body; you become aware of the body. This body anchors all the thoughts. You may not believe – this body itself is a thought; it is memories. Only the awareness in which it arises is not thought. You are awareness. The person, made of thoughts, arises in this awareness.

Awareness is your true nature, your real home. Hari Om, hurry home, says the teacher. You spend too much time in the artificial nest of memories. Come out and fly in the open sky of awareness, your natural habitat. Move from ‘person’ to ‘no person’. Shift from ‘somebody’ to ‘nobody’. Let your abidance in awareness refresh you, and let it reinvigorate the ‘person’ in you. Like electricity empowers all electrical equipment, let your wisdom of the Self enliven your personality in all your (its) relationships.

They say ‘person’ has its roots in a Latin word, which means a mask. You unmask yourself in the stillness of meditation. The person lives in fear. You, the truth behind the mask of the person, are of the nature of love. Fear is artificial, brought about by conditionings and memories. Love is natural and is ever available within you, waiting to be uncovered. In wisdom of the Self, you unravel the greatest mystery of life. All mysticism is of an inferior order.

What is meditation? A hundred kinds of practice are like preparing the bed. They are not meditation, which is like going to sleep. Lying on the most comfortable bed in an air-conditioned room, some just gaze at the ceiling. Some others go to deep sleep on just a bench, even as mercury soars and there is noise around. Likewise, some claim to practice meditation but are in the tight grip of thoughts and memories. The sense of ‘I am this person’ does not leave them. Some others, blessed indeed, become quiet in very simple settings – perhaps while watching a river or as they are seated in their backyard with a cup of tea in their hand. Meditation happens to them.

What is the way to awareness? Attention is the way to attention, the wise say. To stand apart and watch the mechanical ways in which ‘the person’ is behaving is the essence of the practice. Here you find there is no path leading to awareness. Awareness is the path.

Swami Chidananda

Varanasi, March 21, 2012

PS: The first two paragraphs above are based on some observations made by Jean Klein as found in his book Transmission of the Flame (pages 81, 82).

Attention and Awareness

Vibha — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 04:51:56 +0000

Attention and Awareness

Swami Chidananda

Here we shall throw light on light itself. kim jyotih? What is light, asked Sri Adi Shankara in a composition called ekashloki. A whole lot of spiritual insights are packed in a single verse. And that single verse embodies a dialogue.

The teacher asked the student, ‘tell me, what is light?’

The student says ‘during daytime light comes from the sun, at night from various lamps.’

The teacher says ‘that’s wonderful, but when there is sunlight or light of various lamps, how do you see that there is sunlight? How do you see that there is a lamp?’

The student says ‘Oh that is through my eyes, so my eyes are the light.’

The teacher doesn’t stop there, ‘when you open your eyes and when you close your eyes, how does knowing takes place? Light is where knowing take place, in darkness we would not know.’ So taking light in that sense the teacher persists.

The student says, ‘Oh yes, well, in knowing the opening and closing of eyes for me the source of knowledge is my mind, my mind knows, my eyes are open, my eyes are closed.’

‘Oh. And what is the light in which you know your mind itself?’ asked the teacher.

The student is really made to think very deeply or probably not think very deeply, even go beyond the thoughts. ‘How do I know my thoughts?’ and he says, ‘ tatraaham I am the light, I know thoughts’. To know objects there is sunlight or the light of lamp, but that is not enough. My eyes help me to know, behind the eyes there is mind and behind thoughts I am.’

And the teacher says ‘yes, you said it. You are therefore the supreme light. You are. And you are aware. As you are and you are aware, the mind, the eyes and then with the help of these accessories knowing takes place. The first and foremost knowing principle is you, yourself. You are the light of all lights.’

That’s how Sri Krishna pointing to the Truth of our existence in the 13^th chapter of Bhagavad Gita calls it jyotishaam api tad jyotih lights of all lights.

All work and all talk of co-operation are not really meaningful unless we eliminate, by noticing first and then eliminating this self centeredness in us.

Behind all action there is hidden motive in us. We need to notice these undercurrents of seeking power, pleasure and position. Even while paying a tribute to somebody, in deeper level in us there is a calculation. So to notice these motives and undercurrents within us, a subtle Awareness is required and thus we take up this issue of Attention and Awareness, how it can transform our living. Deep transformation is not through thought as it is through Awareness. So we shall try to throw light on these intricacies where the nature of Attention and Awareness will be clarified. And we shall labour to show, this Awareness is not really a tool. Attention or Awareness is not an instrument, it is not something that we can bring and then drop.

Attention or Awareness is not something with a beginning in time and ending in time.

All else, including thoughts which are very subtle have a beginning and an end. And we are not to conceive Awareness as something in us yet another faculty. We are very prone to categorize it as another faculty, ability, a hidden resource, we have this jargon. We would like to call everything as resource, like we would call time as a resource. We have all these jargon in clever living. We talk of various resources and classify them as tangible, intangible resources. Alas! All that classification is an indulgence of this over grown head of ours and Awareness is not within our head. Where is Awareness then?

Vedanta would say, ‘we are Awareness’. If we think Awareness comes in and goes out, it is like saying, ‘we are extinct or absent or dead in between’.

Life is Awareness.

Yet we shall show that there is some sense in talking about ‘paying attention’, ‘failing to pay attention’ etc. What is meant by that? In fact paying attention is not really bringing something into play, it is undoing certain obstacles. The Sun is always shinning. It happens. Clouds come and go. We can’t say, ‘the Sun wasn’t there in between’ though in ordinary language we do say, we might say the Sun is playing hide and seek today. But was the Sun doing anything at all? It was the clouds which were moving. In the same way sometimes we do say, ‘I was not attentive, I was attentive, I was aware, I was not aware.’

But more precisely Awareness is our very nature and all this needs to be understood as how there took place identification with some thoughts. We as though descended into thoughts and saw things from the screen of thoughts.

So we shall go into the nature of Attention and Awareness and try to appreciate how it can transform us.

Life is a whole lot of relationships. From the cradle to the grave, Life moves on in and through relationships. We are related to our own family members, neighbours, people at work, and people in the society at large. We are related to plants and animals, that is life. Very notably and therefore of practical importance is our suffering; typically, is in terms of relationships. If we have a sense of all love us, we feel like being on top of the world. All love us; makes me feel very good and sense of someone does not like me causes a jitter in me. And what do we do generally? There is an attempt on our part to usually react and take things in our hands and find a solution, do something about it. Or some of us want to go to a corner, meditate and change ourselves. We got a model, we have a picture—‘I will change myself. On one hand by intense meditation I will eliminate all my past hurt and pride etc. on the other, I will come back to relationship, thanks to meditation I will be a mature person and in that maturity there will be no more hurt, no more pride, I shall be moving through relationship without likes and dislikes.’ And that is the message we get from lot of scriptures, guru, tradition.

However, as our own observation and our own understanding evolves, without blaming anyone, without blaming any scriptures, we find ‘hey, there is a greater depth to scriptural statements’. My personal understanding of scriptures today is that the scriptures arrange and organize thoughts on different levels depending on our maturity, we get locked. However, the scriptures have much more to say. The very same scriptures which talk heavily in the language of punya-paapa right and wrong, dharma-adharma also has portions where they talk of stillness, where they talk of ‘no division’. So there is an array of various ideas.

Right in the midst of relationship, right when someone hurts us not later on, not as a post mortem exercise, could we handle it? Could we be noticing not just the superficial layer of the hurt but our mind in its entirety?

‘I am hurt’, what does it mean? He said something in the light of which it appears I am not at all competent and I would like to be pictured as competent. I am attached to my image as a competent person, as a pious person. In terms of may be functional skills or in terms of moral fibre. In both there is a commonality, whether you put me down saying, ‘You have the position of assistant professor of Mathematics but you do not deserve to be a lecturer in the institute, it’s through political string pulling that you arrived here everybody knows it, Ok!’ someone says. So my knowledge of Mathematics is questioned and it hurts me. Or somewhere else the character, ‘you are very clever, very learned and very smart but you have no moral scruples, morally speaking you are unscrupulous fellow’ somebody says. So what is questioned there? What is shaken? My picture of myself as an upright person. And the mind springs into reactions. ‘Alright, I am not Gandhi or Vivekananda but I am better than him, how dare he says that?’ ‘First of all it is none of his business to make comments’ and so many reactions. So mind reacts in many ways.

As there are reactions, as there is stimulus and as many things happen, that is where Attention and Awareness can come into picture in a very significant way. If we put what we should do with the situation as something to be done is another compartment. Now I am boiling but I say ‘I shouldn’t be getting angry, I shouldn’t be getting agitated’ but I am getting agitated. In this way what happens is, you lose an opportunity to get first hand understanding of who you are. You have certain sensitivity, certain sensibility, you have what is called touchy areas, you have certain things which you hold very dear to yourself, you have your dreams, you have your aspirations and it is quite a large mass of features. There is something we need to understand. This may be rather challenging, this may be staggering and this may be rather hard for most people. At that time when we are hurt, when there are agitations we just don’t have control over anything. So we feel we need to something after we come home, after everything is done and when we are dying ducks and we have no energy at all. Why compartmentalize? Why judge ourselves as not really competent?

To understand our mind when it is shaking, to understand the engine when there are sparks, when there is noise go and open the hood. Let the engine be on and see why is this peculiar sound coming? Then you have a great chance of knowing the engine and here knowing the self, ego, the little self, the center of desire, fear and therefore hurts and disappointment, elation and feeling good. This is a structure of thoughts.

The tragedy in our living has been there is always some kind of urgency. Look at what we do for so called earning a living. When we are in high school parents also tell us, we too believe; ‘first I must get into such and such course otherwise I miss the boat now, this is very crucial, critical year and when I get into such and such course, then I will look at the life as a whole. Now shut your eyes to everything else and just this’. So this problem of fire fighting, there are so many apparently immediate needs, there are immediate problems and we need to have an immediate solution and one after another. I would say if not always, most of these immediate problems and immediate solutions keep us in a superficial living. They prevent us from living in some amount of depth. And depth is possible by Awareness. This propaganda – this is important, this is immediate, this is urgent, one last time, push yourself, push yourself a little more is by thought what is called thinking. We think and think and think and the thinker in us is himself a heavily conditioned entity. The thinker is not pure, unbiased entity, therefore my thinking differs from your thinking, and my priorities differ from your priorities. How? Because one who sets the priorities here, one who sets the priorities there, one who defines the priorities there, is a programmed entity. We generally don’t look at that programming, that shell is not pierced, we look outward. So can we go a bit slower? Not at the cost of efficiency.

Can we go slowly about life, so that we can understand an activity when it is taking place and not later on?

Don’t do an introspection at night 11.30 pm, how I lived the day? Introspect as you are acting. Right now for example, are you fully aware, why are you here? And am I fully aware why I am giving all these talks?

In fact to equate spirituality with giving lectures, talking, conducting some group activity is not very acceptable but in the world typically it is equated. There is some false equation. Really speaking look at spirituality in its essential nature.

Whatever you are, whatever work you may be doing, to go about the day’s activities with Awareness is the hall mark of spirituality. In that Awareness there is becoming a whole.

Generally we are not aware when we identify with an image and protect it, guard it and seek to enhance it even better. Why do I guard? Day after day guard a certain picture. If I ask then I would say, in asking fundamental questions you will be required to change the very approach from thought being a problem solver to Attention being the problem solver. Because you find a thought, that is thinking, where there is a thinker who has questionable credentials. That’s how Bhagavan Ramana Maharshi with regard to ‘who am I?’ inquiry, very often gave the example of a certain thief who wore policeman’s dress and went about the whole town looking for thief. The thief turned policeman.

In the same way I am asking ‘where is the truth?’ or to be more precise, I am asking, ‘how do I end sorrow?’ ‘How do I put an end to my jealousy?’ but who is this ‘I’. This ‘I’ who is seeking to put an end is taken for granted. All of us take the sense of ‘I’ for granted and therefore we say, unless there is Awareness right when we are acting or doing some action on our part or stimulus from others and then respond to that stimulus from our part; there are several components and as all these are happening, if we are Aware, it would be a very different approach.

To appreciate how this different approach could be potent, very significant, I need to show once more the limitation of thoughts as an approach. For example, I wear a special dress, with a special hat, special badge etc. go for a gathering with all this, thinking people will take notice of it. Some do not notice and some say, ‘what a wonderful hat’ I feel good about it. But surprisingly many others are not noticing it. Now there are two things here, one is there is self consciousness and I could think about it, ‘how come all are not taking note of my special attire?’ and analyze. But second thing I would like to touch on is, I would like to know in this whole process, I could pay attention to my seeking that attention and if I notice that I am seeking attention, up here the ‘I’ has risen, I notice this and in this noticing please ask yourself – Is this noticing also is another thought?

In fact pure noticing is not a thought. Thought has words, thought have images, thought has pictures, and thought has boundaries. Whereas pure noticing is free from thoughts.

Now the wonder of wonder happens. When I intensely notice that I am seeking attention, in my noticing a whole lot of thoughts subside and in the process, self consciousness itself subsides. What is self consciousness? Whether it is good dress or suppose I have a scar on my face, I try to hide it with latest cosmetics but still it didn’t go. The whole, 100 people may not be concerned or if one or two watch, they do not make any issue. But I am very conscious, my mind as though says, ‘are they noticing this scar?’ this is self consciousness. Don’t we say about some people, ‘they have an air about themselves’ and for other we say, ‘O, what we like about her is, she is so unassuming, looking at all her achievement, anyone would have been full of pride, but she is unassuming, she is the same person whom we used to see in good old days.’ The person who has an air about him/her has this self consciousness. The second person who is unassuming I would say, he/she is living in Attention. The second person is able to see and as she sees it there are no thoughts in her about who she is. Please see the positions of Attention and thoughts about oneself towards each other.

If I am seeing something with all Attention, there are no thoughts in me about who I am. And at other extreme, if I have lot of thoughts about who I am and I am thinking about, ‘do they know who I am?’ then I won’t see, even the simplest thing before me. It is like listening to a song, when there are no thoughts about yourself.

In lot of traditional teaching this kind of being free from ego, being free from self consciousness, being free from the thoughts of who I am, in favorable or unfavorable sense, is connected to some kind of mystical experience and out of the way experience.

Sri Ramakrishna was going in a horse driven cart on a busy street in Kolkata and suddenly he stood up and said, ‘maa, maa’ and his dhoti became loose and started coming down. The disciple around him told him, ‘thakorji, your dhoti is slipping.’ But he just went on calling ‘maa maa’ and they held the dhoti in place. After sometime when he came back to normal consciousness and he came to know of the situation, he replied, ‘you people were wondering, as my dhoti was falling and I was wondering that time my body was falling away somewhere’. He was having some kind of out of body experience. Leave alone the consciousness of dhoti, he was not conscious of his body and its certainly very inspiring and much to learn from it but I would say if we compartmentalize, spiritual maturity to losing body consciousness and to ecstasy to the name of Lord and say that alone is, there is terrible injustice to the essential teaching.

What we need to learn from that example too is the common denominator to all excellent ways of living and that is the absence of concern about one’s image. But it need not be through forgetfulness but it could be through great Attention. Imagine one of you are going and the dhoti is slipping and you watch your mind. What embarrassment that is about to rise and in intense watching you say, ‘well, I have no secret to hide, what they will see will be in perfect accordance with the books of biology and anatomy. Ok, let me see’. And in intense seeing you could be free from embarrassment. There is a certain spiritual maturity there, in being free from inhibition, not that one should do it, but I am throwing light on seeing the conditioning in our mind.

All of us have self consciousness. This self consciousness is created by thinking. Thinking can sometimes be non-verbal, there may not be any language words, but there is subtle thought, ‘will someone judge me unfavourably, I hope they judge me as well done.’ So without words, there is machine of thought working at that time. Therefore there is nervousness. If one is totally Attentive, one sees, here is the flower vase which has roses. What is reality? Not Brahman, at that time the reality here is roses, thorn and beautiful vase with beautiful carving on it.

A quiet mind, a still mind, no thought, especially no thought about one’s image. That would be an unassuming simple mind.

It is said, when sage Vyaasa came to the palace of Hastinapura, he was not very good looking. He was tall, dark, with big beard, little terrifying. The two queens Ambikaa and Ambaalika were very nervous. Ambikaa closed her eyes as she embraced him and with his spiritual power he made her conceive and that is how Dhrtaraashtra was born blind. And Ambaalika was also nervous but she didn’t close her eyes and she as though got bleached and therefore son was born all white –Paandu and it was the servant maid who was very unassuming, simple who saw that this is a mahatma and she asked, ‘will you bless me also with a son?’ and he looked at her and sent a power beam. This woman had a simple and very factual mind, no fancy, no aham vrtti no ‘I’ thought in some bizarre way. She too conceived and her son was neither blind nor bleached but a very wise man—Vidura. Today we have Viduraniti for management lessons.

What is self consciousness? And what is the interference of image consciousness? What is the good that comes out from thinking and thinking about the image? If I say, ‘I shouldn’t be having this image consciousness, I shouldn’t be nervous.’ That is again another thought. In fact when you say, ‘I shouldn’t be nervous’, it means you are very concern about the whole thing. To decide, ‘I will not think’ is also again in the field of thought.

So what is Awareness? You and I become aware to some extend that, I am caught in some thoughts rolling out in a mechanical way and yes, the diagnosis is right, what am I to do? This much we appreciate but then comes the query. Should I ask what am I to do? Or why not see, that this ‘what am I to do’ is again a mechanical thought.

If we notice that we are trying to overcome mechanicalness by tools which are also mechanical, we are trying to catch the thief with the help of thief only, it won’t work. So could we be aware, how our very tools are questionable credentials. And in that seeing its limitation, in seeing that thoughts cannot handle thoughts.

One has to see it, just not read and verbalise. Then there is no direct seeing. Then it is like you see someone in police dress and you believe that he is real policeman but a thought passes through the mind, somebody said he is not policeman but I think he is. If you are sure he is policeman then other’s statement will not change our view. So if we ‘see’ there can be a tremendous change. You will have a long term or holistic, a thorough understanding of life never through thought. No wonder even a statement of Thomas Edison in a sense, comes close to it. He said, ‘all discoveries are 99% perspiration and 1% inspiration.’ Thought is in the realm of perspiration but then inspiration is an intuition.

And here through thought, through some honest thinking, we see the limitation of thinking and then we stay still, in that stillness, whatever has to happen will happen.

Food-shelter-clothing are certain immediate need of ours but you know how thoughts have made it so complicated. Food, not for just today, for tomorrow, for days to come, for our children, for our grandchildren. I know many spiritual seekers who have said to me, ‘we are going to put large fixed deposits and then have a little cottage in Rishikesh that with the pillow of fixed deposits I will sit and listen.’

Now all of us do it but can’t we see there is a contradiction there in the thinking, not in the actual doing, but in that psychological dependence. Can you notice the mind is attached and goes again and again into the material? Suppose there is a sadhu who does not have any possession but has put one loin cloth to dry outside and he goes on thinking of it during his japa, ‘I hope it does not fly away’ psychologically both are equal. Physically there are differences and we are concerned with this—why are we caught in thought? Why we don’t do what needs to be done? And then pay full attention to the next event, next interaction, and next transaction.

Lastly, in this Awareness by seeing limitations of thoughts we arrive at a state of ‘not doing’. The state of ‘not doing’ appears scary but that is the secret, do it and see. I don’t mean you stop doing a particular activity, but about that activity you are not doing anything. But ordinarily in the spiritual context, in the saadhanaa context, in self development context, I think of doing something. Don’t go to extreme of stopping the activity. For example you are driving and the engine is on and the sparks are seen.

So one is the transaction proper, one is in the activity proper, one is in the give and take proper; one is this field of action, stimulus, response and another is the issue of how to handle it?

And in the matter of how to handle, having identified as not very proper, things are not going well, my legs are trembling.’ So there is judgment of thought. ‘I shouldn’t be trembling, why am I trembling? Now what should I do?’ this is expenditure of thought. Can I only see the trembling of my legs? Without judging ‘This is bad; that is good’. And if my mind judges by sheer habit, watch that judging that your mind does out of sheer habit. And in this you come out of limitation or the narrowness or the grove into which you are always stuck.

In conclusion

In watching and not dissipating energy, dissipating thoughts, in ‘what to do? Etc. there is a spontaneous expansion with no boundary and the whole of life, the whole of mind, the whole of what you see and what you say, what you perceive and what you respond; this whole thing and with all its layers, is one then. You have not divided it. And inone piece, in one whole, in this Awareness, there is transformation, that you don’t bring about, but it happens.

Kali after killing asuraas demons is in such a fury. Now people including devatas are afraid that she will kill everybody. They request Shiva to handle the situation. Shiva goes and lies down as a road block. Kali with blood stained sword in her hand is rushing and whoever comes in her way their heads are gone. And she steps on Shiva’s chest. This is the sat tattva mind, Sakti, a power comes in touch with sat. Sat steady substrate and the mind calms. Kali calms down there. Shiva doesn’t do anything. He illustrates the sat tattva by allowing Kali to step on his chest and then she calms down

Elsewhere there is another puraanical episode… Shiva just opens his third eye and sees Kamadeva, Kamadeva turns to ashes. That is Shiva’s seeing, Awareness, Light, Attention. In the flame of Attention Kamadeva– lust, greed, jealousy goes away. Here He illustrates cit tattva seeing, is burning Kamadeva with only seeing. No mantra, no tantra, no weapon.

And he illustrates aananda tattva by general position in meditation. He has this bliss which is uncaused— uncaused happiness—natural happiness. sat-cit-aananda…

To indulge in examples and enjoy them and to go into the language and the art, that is the exercise of thought. Take the example and just be aware with no intervention of thought about how to handle. Let there be thought for activity, that is called functional thinking. If you are greeting your daughter on her birthday, say it and if the emotion rises; don’t say, ‘why are emotion coming?’ No, emotions are natural. But these thoughts like, ‘after all this Vedanta, I am so emotional today’ that’s the terrible thing that’s the culprit. So thinking of second level thoughts and how to control it. That judging part is questionable intervention. Find out for yourself, what it does, through Attention.

”Awareness is that observation, that Attentiveness in which the entirety of thought or thoughts, the entirety of whole network of thoughts becomes visible, becomes apparent. Unlike when we are an analyser or a thinker, how smart or how clever we may be.

” As we analyse or think, we are in a part and we see another part. It is a part versus part. In Awareness, in true Attention, it is the whole of the mind sitting lightly in something by far subtler than thought itself.”

Regaining Peace and Happiness

Vibha — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 05:11:54 +0000

REGAINING PEACE AND HAPPINESS

Guidance from Viveka Choodamani

Swami Chidananda

Peace is something that everybody wants. Every one wants happiness in life. Vedanta is marked by the choice of the word regaining, rather than gaining, in the context of finding peace and happiness in life. The preference is based on the understanding that peace and happiness are within us; they are our nature. It is difficult for us to believe that we are by nature happy, for we find a lot of sorrow everywhere around us in the world. Admittedly, there is celebration also everywhere and we find people smiling, if not laughing but, upon getting closer to anybody apparently happy, we discover there is sorrow. Even celebrities have problems and millionaires have suffering, which is not visible to the general public. Peace, in a sustained manner, is a rare commodity in the world. Some friction seems to erupt when two people get together and start working together. In fact, many people who are known to have written volumes on happy living have confessed that they themselves have not found it yet. Once two scholars were asked to stay together and share an accommodation. They had advised their audiences on many occasions on living in harmony in the spirit of tolerance. “Find love, do not find fault with each other; see the divine in the other person,” they had written. They could not tolerate each other’s idiosyncrasies and, being unable to live under the same roof for more than 15 days, demanded separate, independent space. They were eager to have their own ‘empire’ of some sort, undisturbed by anybody.

If I may borrow a way of expressing for which Krishna ji (Shri J Krishnamurti) was known, I would say each of those two scholars is us. Every one of us has this divide between the values that we preach and the way we live. Why this disconnect? Where have we failed? All of us are clever enough to accumulate knowledge. We are smart and sophisticated. We have filled our heads with so much information but we are unable to live in peace, when it comes to actual living. Our own thinking brings us somehow to discontent and dissatisfaction. Thought leads us sometimes to even possibilities of suicide.

Reassuring Message

Many saints and mystics have however given us a positive message amidst all this chaos. They have declared that peace is very near us. It is within us. It is our very nature. “Freedom is as close to us as is the waker to the dreamer,” said Swami Chinmayananda, my Vedanta teacher. He once dramatically described the terrible predicament of somebody whom an elephant was chasing in the midst of a thick forest. Even as he tried his best, he could not really save himself from the animal that as after him. He tripped and fell down on his back. The elephant put one of its feet upon his chest and the man began to scream… it was then that he woke up from his dream to find he was on his own bed in his comfortable home. (There was no elephant’s foot on his chest, Swamiji would add humorously, but his wife’s loving hand was upon his chest, and he could hear her inquire, are you all right, honey?) How far was the safe and comfortable man from the fear-stricken one facing death? How far is the rope from the misapprehended snake, when a passerby mistakes a rope for a snake in the dim evening light?

This assurance that right seeing helps us regain peace is the undercurrent of the Vedanta teachings. Zen Buddhism, Sufi mysticism, certain interpretations of sayings of the Christ and the message of J Krishnamurti are also seen as centred in ending of wrong seeing and coming upon right perception. Thought affects our perception and negative emotions like fear, loneliness and anger arise. Ignorance and various ideas made possible by ignorance are behind this state of affairs. Right knowledge (jnana, gyan) is required to end this ignorance. The word knowledge has a different connotation in the teachings of masters like Krishnamurti and they prefer words like insight, right seeing or correct perception.

Sandalwood is Fragrant

Viveak Choodamani, a great work running into 580 verses and attributed to Adi Shankaracharya, compares every one of us with a piece of sandalwood¹, which has wonderful fragrance. This piece, however, may come in contact with moisture and a layer of moss or fungus may grow upon it. People would then get a bad smell instead of the good, natural one.

Winds bring clouds² (and block the sun) and they take away the clouds too, says the Choodamani at another place. In like manner, our mind (with its misconceived thoughts) deludes us but this same mind, upon being illumined by the light of Vedanta, helps us see our well-being and fullness.

If a real tiger comes in front of us, we are in danger. Our mind is not imagining a tiger but a real one is staring at us. We suffer biological insecurity. Natural calamities like earthquake or man-made problems like terrorism do put us sometimes in situations of biological insecurity. Otherwise we suffer generally from psychological insecurity, which is much more common. The fear that our love may not be returned, than people may not receive us well or the thought that our children do not care for us anymore etc have much to do with how we see. Even if we say it is not imagination but as real as the physical dangers mentioned before, we must admit that our conditionings and beliefs play a major role in the formation of these fears that constitute psychological insecurity. Spiritual fitness keeps such fears away. Once fear is away, positive qualities like sensitivity, caring and love exude from us. Vedanta and similar streams of wisdom clear our thinking (and the way we see situations) and give to us spiritual well-being.

Crest Jewel of Discrimination

Vedanta³ is essentially the Upanishads, which are pieces of advanced, philosophical discussions found in the four Vedas. In the broader definition, a number of texts like Atma Bodha of Shankaracharya, Panchadashi of Vidyaranya and Advaita Makaranda of Lakshmidhara are also considered Vedanta texts. Shankara’s commentaries on the Upanishads, the Geeta and the Brahma-sootras (the three together called prasthaana-traya) get the pride of place among Vedanta works. Viveka-Choodamani is one of such Vedanta works which has been very popular over the centuries thanks to the wonderful coverage of topics and an excellent presentation of poetry with apt illustrations.

Two areas are covered by spiritual texts and they are a) personality integration and b) transcendence of the self. While a scripture like the Bhagavad-Geeta covers both these areas, Viveka Choodamani is an intensive work on the latter domain. Geeta is called yoga-shaastra for it helps us imbibe noble values pertaining to daily life. It is also referred to as brahma-vidya for it has revelations pointing to erasure of the ego. The first domain is about purifying our inner equipment (antah-karana) and the second is about transcending the same. Also referred to as dharma and Brahma, these two disciplines are the summary of thousands of spiritual teachings. One moves from bad ego to healthy ego, and then goes for annihilation of ego.

Wisdom the Best Deodorant

The foul smell of the ego is to be eliminated for us to regain peace and happiness. In the selected verse of Viveka Choodamani, Shankara talks about a piece of sandalwood that is by nature very fragrant. Alas, bad odour has come about it as it came in touch with water. The moisture caused some moss or fungus to grow upon the surface of the sandalwood and there is only an unpleasant smell now. Even as you are set to throw away this piece of sandalwood, not knowing its value, a friend tells you to stop. She asks you to take a piece of sand paper and rub the surface of the object. The result of this exercise is amazing. You discover that every bit of this possession of yours is endowed with divine fragrance. The perfume is irresistible.

jalaadi-samparka-vashaad prabhoota-durgandha-dhoota-agaru-divya-vaasanaa
sangharshanenaiva vibhaati samyak vidhooyamaane sati baahya-gandhe

antah-shritaananta-duranta-vaasanaa-dhoolee-viliptaa paramaatma-vaasana

pragyaati-sangharshanato vishuddhaa prateeyate chandana-gandhavat sphutam 274

The divine fragrance of a piece of sandalwood gets hidden when moisture causes a foul-smelling layer to cover it. By friction (with sandpaper), this layer is removed and the outer smell goes away. The pleasant smell is now obtained without obstruction. Our intuitional grasp of our own divinity is also similarly covered by the dirt of countless worldly tendencies that have accumulated in our unconscious mind. Right knowledge (insight) causes a churning within, which purifies us and our true nature then shines forth like the fragrance of the sandalwood. Verse 274

Clean the Old Ink Bottle

An old ink bottle needs to be cleaned. It has some ink sticking to its inner surface. We pour clean, fresh water into it and shake the bottle well. We repeat this many times and the bottle starts shining. In like manner, as the author of a book titled Mind and Its Control puts it, repeated satsanga (holy company), where we receive noble thoughts and gain good outlooks, leads to inner purification. Our natural goodness then shines forth. In a lighter vein, I may share something here. I once described this illustration of the old ink bottle and perhaps over-emphasized the need to shake the bottle after filling it with fresh, clean water. A student of mine applied this to his meditation. After a few days, he said to me, “Sir, I sit daily for meditation and fill my head with uplifting thoughts from holy books. And I shake my head too so as to speed up the purification process!”

No physical rubbing is required in the theme proper. What is the friction here? It is no other than self-inquiry. The Vedanta says, “You are OK. tat tvam asi.” The student translates this revelation to her own context and says, “I am OK. aham brahmaasmi.” A proper study of the science helps her see the truth of this revelation. This new understanding – I AM OK – comes in friction with the old bundle of wrong notions – I am incomplete; I am a failure; I am not loved; I cannot love. These false ideas are the foul smell upon the sandalwood piece. Insights derived from satsanga are the sandpaper that rubs away the false thoughts. “If you find anything that weakens you physically, emotionally or spiritually, reject it as poise,” thundered Swami Vivekananda. Study, reflection and meditation are the effective way to (have the capacity to) reject all poison.

Core of the Issue

Self-judgment is at the centre of our suffering. The thought, “I am no good,” makes us miserable. There was a great CEO of a company in New York, who had worked hard to take his organization to great heights. He had somehow not cared much for his own personal savings. Some politics led to the unexpected removal of this man one morning from his position. His family was shocked. He somehow managed to get into another, much smaller company, and slowly rose to the position of its CEO. He took this second company now to ever greater heights, making it ten times richer than the previous one. Two years ago, he was in Mumbai and Times of India interviewed him. Referring to the day he was fired from the first company, he made a comment, “When I lost my job, my net-worth fell to rock bottom; but my self-worth somehow was as good as ever.”

The realization through the Vedanta wisdom – I am OK (aham brahma asmi) – is the statement of the highest self-worth. This is irrespective of the net-worth, which may be in terms of money, popularity and so on. All of us carry ideas, “I am good here, weak there, nice over here and terrible over there etc.” These thoughts, arising out of memories, make the self. “The ego is a bundle of memories,” remarked Swami Chinmayananda. We remain trapped in the net of memories. The truth is – I am Awareness. Dada Gavand, a saint living presently near Mumbai, wrote a book titled Intelligence Beyond Thought. Masters like Ramana Maharshi, Nisargadatta and J Krishnamurti point to something not touched by thought. The Upanishads spoke about that something and nothing else.

Inquire Who am I? Erase all false ideas of being high or low. Stay with I am, let go of all notions of I am this or I am that. Watch the movement of the self, and let the centre of suffering vanish in the flame of awareness. Peace and happiness are ours in an effortless manner, when the liberating insight dawns on us.

Notes:

1 Viveka-Choodamani verse 274

2 Viveka-Choodamani verse 174

3 Vedaanto naama upanishat-pramaanam – Sadananda in Vedanta-Saara

Believe in Yourself

Vibha — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 10:45:21 +0000

Surge 85

Believe in Yourself

You can discover unalloyed happiness within yourself, if you do not let ‘conditioned thinking’ judge you in umpteen ways. ‘Thought’ itself is like the cave in Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, where the prisoners take to be real what in fact is an illusion. One prisoner escapes and comes out of the cave, to see the bright sunlight outside. The Upanishads speak of the domain of Awareness (chit), in contrast to the field of thought (chitta). Rare is the individual who leaves the cave (thought) and beholds the sunshine (Awareness).

You can anytime step out. Be that rare individual who leaves the cave. Neither academic qualifications nor some special intellectual background is needed to do it. Though it is not common, everybody is always close to doing it. Easy to do (susukham, Geeta 9.2), it is described as something that everybody wants really. Yes, one in a million takes this step. All look out but a rare one turns inward, says the Kathopanishad (2.1.1). You can be that rare one. It does not matter how old you are or whether you are female or male. Freedom is as far as the waker is from the dreamer, said Swami Chinmayananda. In your dream, you were in Chicago and wanted to go home in Cupertino. When you wake up, you realize that you were all along in Cupertino itself. It was never far.

Believe in yourself. You are the sun, reflected sometimes in the holy waters of the Ganges and at other times in the dirty pool in a slum area too. Let not the medium where you are reflected bother you. Thoughts are the medium. They make you feel great at times and miserably low at other. The insight of the Vedanta is that you are the same sun, no matter where you are reflected. This insight naturally makes you accept yourself as you are, gladly, without any complaint. You then say, “I am OK” (aham brahma asmi).

You do not need any reason, to turn inward. An excuse is enough. Let the New Year 2012 be the excuse. Celebrate your true nature as Awareness beginning January 1. Day after day, come out of the cave (of thought) and bask in the sun (of Awareness). Do not get stuck in any judgment. As Krishnamurti would advise, do not be in a hurry to find answers but stay with the question. Do not sink in ideas of “I am good,” or “I am bad”. Hold instead the question, “Who am I?” Be aware of a hundred opinions but stay primarily in the vast sky (akasha) of nonjudgmental awareness.

When you stay in this self-acceptance, the peace you experience is itself love. Great action flows from this state of love. You will solve all problems that can be solved. You will smile at the rest.

Swami Chidananda

Varanasi

Saturday, December 31, 2011

Work and Co-operation

Vibha — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 09:45:00 +0000

WORK AND CO-OPERATION

Swami Chidananda

You and I have been working, we must work. Till our last breath we shall be doing some work or the other. If not in an official sense or if not in a formal sense, we shall be working, for even breathing is considered as an activity. Without some activity, without a bit of some work, we cannot imagine our day going. So work is an inseparable part of our living. We come to the second part of the title, Co-operation. The question of Co-operation comes up when more than one person is involved in the work and there too till our last breath we are with others. No one is alone at all; No one is in an island. Thus relatedness to people and work are part of our life. So we take these two – Work and Co-operation and as an advance summary of what I shall in detail present. I may say that riding ourselves of motives and divisive identification, alone brings true work. It makes possible true Work and true Co-operation. Otherwise all work apparently done in not much sense of Co-operation brings us back to square one. At the end of it all we find our hands have mere ashes.

We shall see that working and working together becomes truly meaningful when we put Love and Goodness as the very starting point, when we have this loving heart and unconditional goodness as the very foundation. To put peace, love, freedom, goodness etc. at the end of the road and say that ‘we shall employ wrong means and arrive at right end’, is foolishness. A means is never separate from end. Apparently it is a harsh truth; however when one embraces the truth, truth is never harsh. When one is caught in the false and has resistance to any movement out of that false, truth becomes very harsh. Good advice also becomes very unpalatable. That’s because we are attached to a groove of thinking, we are so prompted, so driven by a certain pattern of thinking and acting. There is certain impatience about us and we say, ‘allow me to complete this, allow me to finish this whole thing and then talk to me about the right way’. This is karma aasakti an attachment to karma.

Bhagavad Gita describes this in the context of the quality called rajas. Everything in the world is driven by these three qualities – sattva, rajas and tamas.

Sattva—insight and equanimity
Rajas—restlessness and activity
Tamas—insensitivity and inaction.

In the context of rajoguna (restlessness and activity), the Bhagavad Gita has to say aarambhah karmanaam àwithout much understanding we get going with activity. It’s like you are on the road, sitting next to somebody in his car and you ask him, ‘where are we going?’ and he says, ‘don’t ask, you will find out after some distance, I too don’t know, but we got to keep on going’. Somebody is climbing a ladder and you ask ‘where are you climbing?’ he says ‘don’t disturb me, we’ll figure it out when we reach there’. If you do it with true sportiveness, that’s wonderful. But if there is an attachment to a certain idea that I shall arrive at such and such place and actually you have no understanding of what you are doing, in all likelihood you are in for great disappointment.

So once more we are looking at our outlook to work and our understanding of co-operation keeping in mind possible obstructions right within us, which abort the true activity and bring about disorder. None of what we are talking here is anything new. In the language of Bhagavad Gita, Sri Krishna had again and again pointed out that a desire prompted activity, while it has certain glitters and charm, comes across as dynamism but many a times is actually the womb of pain, womb of sorrow. So desire (selfish) prompted activity apparently wonderful, but is the cause of pain. Love prompted activity alone is truly harmonizing. In the good old language, Love prompted activity is called nishkaama karma. Literally translated as activity devoid of selfish desire, upon being put in so called positive language is activity prompted by love, activity prompted by true goodness.

Desire prompted activity is lower but you and I from our birth are caught in desire. I would throw light on the universal human conditioning. Universal when I say means in Asia or Europe, in America or Africa, among the very rich who are born with the silver spoon and among the very poor this conditioning is same. The sense of incompleteness and having to prove oneself, having to achieve something and in the light of that achievement put up a façade, put up an image and that becomes a wild goose chase.

No wonder work takes place in this world of ours, in the world we have created through coercion, compulsion or a gentle word called persuasion. By coercing, compelling and persuading work is got done. Sometimes the compulsion comes from outside, other time the compulsion is from within and we need to wonder, can we work in the absence of compulsion? That could be work out of love. Love is not a compulsion, love is our nature. We are at peace with love; we are at home with love. Compulsion on the other hand makes us do a lot but we are never at home. So we would be waiting, ‘once I make enough money and once I reach a certain position, I am done, I just want to give up all these’.

Isn’t it a sad truth that, what we see around in the world – Nobel Prize winners, Olympic gold medalist, Presidents, Prime ministers, eminent people from Hollywood or Bollywood and you name it, are all on one hand stealing so much of attention. They are in lime light but on the other, in their privacy looking for peace. Very often we hear about a Hollywood star looking for peace among the Himalayan mountains. So what do people from at a distance look at them? We look at them with envy – ‘if I could be him/her’. Only those who wear the shoes know where the pinch is. I think Shakespeare had said, “Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown.” But you and I tend to be foolish. We think ‘all that is fine but for a day I would like to wear the crown’. We are after this peculiar self contradicting pleasure, which once more shows that alas! Humanity lives in great confusion. This is the human conditioning to which all of us are subject.

It is up to everyone, it is up to the person to really live differently. A certain willingness to change has to arise in a natural way and willingness to change arises, scientifically speaking only when there is a very intense recognition that, ‘this way is not for me to live’. When I am fooling, more than fooling X or Y, more than fooling my religious organization, the way I am living is such, I am fooling myself. This self deception should become evident to us. And in that becoming of very evident of the self deception one says, ‘no matter what, I am going to live in the right way, without any presumption, without any motive which holds an achievement at the end of the road as a glittering promise but actually acts like a thorn in our flesh.’ From early childhood you and I are carrying certain patterns of thinking which like thorn in our flesh paining us and continues to pain us, is no other than the self centered motive.

If it is not hope of reward or fear of punishment, what would prompt working? Generally we feel we are at a loss unless there is some reward. Why would you work? Love is fine, but if there is no reward I would rather lay back. Is it really so? How about our seeing a problem intensely? We see there is starvation and we are truly perturbed. Unfortunately very few are truly perturbed about any genuine problem of humanity. Because most of our energy is dissipated in our concerns about psychological and self created problems. We are in such hurry, we are so impatient and we reason it out ‘oh, I feel very concerned about it but you know may be I shall write a cheque and send’. Some such thing we do. Many a time we don’t do it also a thought passes by and we say, ‘that’s good I am a virtuous person and I thought of helping them’. May be like a counterpart to work and the thought of work—here could say some people feel clear conscience by rendering help, many other feel clear conscience by thinking of helping. Just thought of helping, gives them great satisfaction. Its right in us here and this is not intended to blame or condemn oneself, it is to become aware. We are in great hurry, we are not sure and life goes on. And what are we achieving? What are we fulfilling? Some goals that has been set against the backdrop of very poor understanding of life. Some goals that have been put before us through conditioning—he did it, I would like to do it; he got it, I would like to get it. I guess this is how we have to move towards—I imitate you, you imitate someone else, a whole lot of blind following takes place. No wonder, Mundakopanishad calls this general human behaviour as blind leading blind.

As we observe life we find this is such a true commentary on our own living. So if there is a problem, we directly see and with no dissipation of energy in all kinds of associated questions, we are able to protect and preserve that basic concern, it can prompt us to work. Let us say there is starvation and you and I are concerned. We now think of it— if you and I upon being concerned which follows from seeing the problem, start thinking—how shall we do this? And suppose God forbid we start arguing or disagreeing each other about the way of doing it, on some symbols—whether we go and serve food there with this banner or that banner flying high and then I say, ‘if you are going to put your banner up than I am not coming and you say, so do I, I will not come if you are going to raise your banner.’ we fight between each other and we don’t go there at all.

Your way, my way, secularly or religiously too humanity has shed a lot of blood on all kinds of insistence on the way—on the banner and that is exactly kaama the personal desire. I shall help you, if you put my name somewhere—so terrible!

So can we go about living life without mixing up issues? In Vedanta or spirituality, if it is truth that we see as the source of true peace, nowhere else but in Truth there is peace. Can we seek that Truth, doing away with all the externalities? But this clever mind of human beings which you and I are, always like a clever attorney makes a case for all externalities, to arrive at that truth certain steps are necessary—some symbol, some clothes, some name, some title, some superiority, some authority, bow down here and enjoy other bowing down at another place. A structure is made and the clever thought, the intellect, makes a case for whole lot of structures and in this complicated structure many a times unknowingly lot of new divisions come about.

Spirituality structured and certain powers & rights, liberties & privileges as well as certain commitments & pressures all packaged into various levels from the Pope down to the new initiates, from mathaadhipati to new brahmachaari who has joined the ashram—all is structured and the clever intellect makes a very detailed case for all this. And then you have the statements like—these are made by Swami Vivekananda—when he was asked about hypocrisy in religions. He said, there is hypocrisy in religion, but I would say even if one person in thousand becomes a genuine seeker, the world will be up lifted. His faith, his love, his belief is admirable but practically the ground reality is, we find, countless religions and sub divisions of religions are all come about and we don’t know whether the world is saved or the world is moving towards the greater order because of all these structures.

In work what corrupts and what dilutes our passion for work itself, as an example we took starvation and you and I would like to do something—what comes in the way of our just doing it? We find thoughts about, who would recognize? Who would care? Nobody cares for it. People criticize, people make fun of it and this is not the time to do these things and so on. So desiring recognition, desiring some acknowledgment, desiring an approval from A or B, fearing disapproval, fearing criticism with all this there is a dilution of the basic force of Love. The basic force of Love gets weakened; the light of Love as though gets dim. Now you can see, how thought, of which humanity is proud is at once its enemy also. Many a times in this world, it is some mad-cap who goes and does the service not the educated one, because educated ones have lot of thinking.

What is thought? In the movie ‘Titanic’ there is a scenario—towards the end of the movie. The ship is broken to pieces and through some life-boats, everybody is helped to reach the shore but then there is a noble(rich) man there, he protests even at that moment, even when it is the question of life or death. When the captain says, ‘please get in this life-boat which is about to leave.’ He makes a face and says, ‘you mean I have to get in the same boat where those servants are?’ See what thought does. Even when his life is in question and he keeps in mind class distinction or some caste distinction. ‘Isn’t there another boat for Noble class?’ The man was used to all through years protesting and the air about him doesn’t leave even on such occasion.

Thought comes in the way of our working in a simple way, relating in a simple way. So can we come upon a silent mind? Not silent out of tiredness. That is a sleepy silence. Isn’t there a silence that you and I can arrive at when we see the horror of our own selfishness and say, ‘I don’t care for this fame anymore, because this doesn’t make sense’. Not because book says don’t seek fame, when you conform to a book. ‘A mere scholarship doesn’t help’ says, the old classic bhajagovindam –love God, love of God alone saves you and scholarship. And our mind immediately says, ‘yes, I should not go for scholarship’ then perhaps you have not seen how seeking to be a scholar actually is shallow and hollow, but the book is saying. We are talking of shedding, a letting go of the desire to be a scholar. A letting go of that desire upon seeing that it just is not necessary. It could happen through total surrender to God. ‘All knowledge that I need to get will come to me, I need not stuff myself with books’ and then say, when will I read this?’

If there is a profound insight, where one truly knows that God will give to me all knowledge, I don’t have to read a single book, I have love for God and then pillar and posts, trees and stones will speak to me, I will learn from everything. Then one sheds…what we are talking is very much like paraabhakti effectiveness and etc in the name of all these the rotten things deep in me is staying intact and as long as that doesn’t go, all this dynamism is of no use. I become another destructive force. Of course with a façade of do-gooder. I am a do-gooder outwardly but deep inside I am seeking a gratification. Earlier I sought material image, now I could be seeking a moral image.

The true selflessness is when one doesn’t seek to become selfless. When you seek to become selfless, the thought comes in the way. Instead, see the horror of selfishness and don’t think anymore—should I be selfish? Or should I be selfless? To sip a little bit of water, you need not remember your name, your credentials. Do I have to say, ‘Who am I?’ Drinking a sip of water is very simple. There you need tongue and mouth and perception of water – cold or hot, sweet or salty and as it goes down your system is perception and there is no conception. You don’t conceive especially about yourself, who you are?

But when it comes to work and co-operation and a whole lot of thoughts come up and they come in the way of actual action. Is it possible for us to be in direct contact with the problem with least dissipation of thoughts and comparison, motive etc?

We know phalaasakti attachment to reward, result. Very often we have a very limited view of that. We say, ‘we should be working without attachment to the result.’ That’s what Bhagavad Gita seems to tell us. And we will say, “As Sri Krishna has said so I shall push myself to work.” Very dim and it is more in language of ‘should’ and ‘should not’. Actually I want to win but this Gita says don’t worry about winning, what a terrible thing! In west they say winning is not everything, it is the only thing. And my heart likes that but I joined this Gita classes and I am in soup now like that there is so much of confusion.

These thoughts which I am sharing with you is not about future at all, it is about carrying the thought ‘now’ and it is about noticing the thought ‘now’. Whether there really is future? God knows, we never know how long our life is, young and old die. Or why to talk of death, many a times so many situations entirely change. So we know in small and big ways, a lot of things, the actual events don’t take place at all. Life takes another turn. Someone gave the definition “Life is what happens when you are busy with other plans.”

So advanced understanding of letting go of our concern for success or failure is actually this awareness of, how selfish concern dilutes, weakens and comes in the way of our love and goodness. ‘I am not able to do my days work with love and goodness, because I am concerned about my image, will be better at the end of this work as my image in other’s eyes and my eyes etc. This concern for my image is taking away, what is most precious to me, LOVE. I wish to live in love, not any compartmentalized love. True love is that defies any compartmentalization. True love is a sense of well being, where there is no fear, no insecurity, where you accept yourself as you are and you accept the other human being as he or she is, with no interruption or intervention of calculativeness that is love.

What is love? àWhen we are actually giving to each other much happiness. When we don’t see each other as we are but we see each other through memories and some account that is kept in these memories and images coming, these images assuming larger and larger size, they grow and they edge out, push out the way for objective thinking.

Can we be attentive to a problem, physical-emotional, to others or to us? In fact where there is denial of love whether it is others or oneself, let us be concerned about it. Where there is hunger, whether it is others or ourselves, let us be concerned about it, because it is a problem. Let us stay alert against intervention of all kinds of man created thought processes, phalaasakti being one of them, seeking credit, seeking one-upmanship etc. are problems; awareness of these problems, the ways, the means, the system etc. seeing all these dilutes come in the way. A direct concern of the problem on the part of all of us, a tremendous direct concern for the problem proper, brings forth work and brings forth co-operation. Whereas fear of punishment and hope for personal reward causes diversion, they cause dilution and blurring of our vision. They cause so much of unhappiness.

In conclusion

Ordinarily work is prompted by desire or fear and seeking of power, position and importance, fearing that such power, position may not come to us.

Ordinarily team building is also facilitated by reward and punishment. Both team work and individual work is done with fear or desire. One sees how this is an endless affair. The root cause, the basic problem is not at all solved by this. One only ends up in an external improvement, which is not of much value.

For a mutation, for a radical change, one eliminates this thought created desire and fear and just does what is to be done. The silent mind acts upon the issue on hand with just the necessary memory, data, or information or skill and no other thing and upon finishing; the silent mind is back to literal silence.

Thus rather than a calculative mind, the complaining, comparing, regretting and priding mind, there is a mind which comes in contact with a problem, facilitates activity and goes back to silence.

Harih Om !

Life is short and yet beautiful

Vibha — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 15:11:00 +0000

Surge 84

Life is Short and Yet Beautiful

Celebrate this Diwali with the reassuring message of the Upanishads – The Lord resides in your body. He is the Light of lights, and the perishable body borrows light from Him. On the surface, life is short indeed and there is the dance of death everywhere. Your dear and near ones are not with you forever and, remember, you too have to pack up and go, one of these days. But who goes? Every body dies, nobody dies.

Know the body as the chariot.

Atman (Self) is the Lord of the chariot.

The intellect is the charioteer and,

The mind makes the reins. – Kathopanishad 1.3.3

That our life is short is in no way a negative message. This law of Nature has its own wisdom. We must go, in order to make room for others just as many left before us and we took their place. Demons like Ravana departed from this earth and divine incarnations like Rama also did not stay forever. Who are we to cling to this physical existence?

Our journey in and through this body is short-lived. To see this fact should not depress us. It should rather help us gather all our energy to have a vision of our own spiritual dimension. “We are not a body having a soul; we are rather the soul having a body,” remarked some wise man once. The earlier we see the soul, the better. The Vedanta of course clarifies that we cannot literally see the soul, for we are the soul. To see means here to understand. As we understand our own deeper nature, we are freed from all kinds of insecurity. Knowing our own imperishable nature, we become fountains of love and compassion.

Two horses – prana and apana – drive this chariot, the body, says Swami Srikantananda in his little book¹ Meditation According to Vedanta. The Lord of the Universe (Jagannatha) is seated in the chariot (Ratha). Realizing Him is the only way to liberation². How blessed we are, to have this opportunity to see the Lord. This metaphoric language implies we have a higher potential in us which is way above our personality as we usually know. Tension, stress, fear, loneliness, disappointment or frustration often marks our day. [Sam asked Tom, “What were you before you became a manager at this company?” Tom’s answer was, “Happy.” Isn’t there a Tom in every one of us?] We have unhappiness in life. The Lord in the chariot is no other than yourself, as you will discover when all negative thoughts disappear and your last trace of low self-esteem vanishes.

So question the self (ego) put together by thought. Let not your conditioned mind deceive you. Rise above the weakening influences of the world and celebrate Diwali by knowing yourself to be the Light of Awareness.

Wishing you Happy Diwali,

Swami Chidananda

Varanasi, October 26, 2011

Notes:

1 Dhyana-Sadhana – Meditation According to Vedanta by Swami Srikantananda, published by Vivekananda Institute of Human Excellence, Hyderabad, page 5.

2 (Hindi)

praan apaan do ghodon se

chalta jeevan kaa rath

rath mein baithe Jagannath kaa

darshan hee mukti kaa path.