Human birth is best due to endowment of the special quality of power of discrimination between good and bad and eternal and non-eternal. Physical bodies are in the grip of numerous births and deaths, and are subject to many other drawbacks. This renders the physical body to being non-eternal. If this physical body is non-eternal then the body’s sense organs must also be non-eternal and whatever is perceived by non-eternal sense organs must also be non-eternal. Therefore, if there should be any eternal entity, it must exist beyond the comprehension of human material non-eternal sense organs.
In the Mahabharata, Arjuna was blessed with divine eyes, so that he may witness the vishwarupa of Krishna, a dazzling sight. Thousands were present at Kurukshetra when Krishna revealed His Virat form, yet Arjuna was the only one to see Him like that. Why?
The Supreme God is infinite; everything about Him is infinite. He has created countless species to a plan. If one accepts that human beings can determine their own cause by means of material senses, mind or intellect, then that will be a mentally or intellectually concocted thing. That will not be Reality. If Reality is in fact Reality, then He must always exist. What is the Truth? Why do we wish to be eternal? Why are we eager to learn and to experience bliss? We are a part of the Supreme – so we are like the Supreme in some respects. He is Sacchidananda and so are we. Sat in Sanskrit means eternal life, chit is eternal knowledge and ananda is eternal bliss. Soul is sacchidananda. We were given this limited body to know our true identity. Our duty is not to hanker after temporary bliss, but to have eternal bliss. We have to find ways to realise our true identity to become servants of Sacchidananda. Since we are part of the Supreme Lord, it is our primary task to serve Him or to act in a way that pleases Him. Once we realise Him, we will also realise other eternal truths, and know that not only He, but His Associates, too, do not take birth, but descend.
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Showing posts with label about. Show all posts
A song about this lotus honey
Srīla Rupa Gosvamī, the great devotee acarya of the Gaudīya-Vaiṣṇava-sampradāya, has sung a song about this lotus honey, comparing himself to the bee:
"O my Lord Kṛṣṇa, I beg to offer my prayers unto You. My mind is like the bee, and it is after some honey. Kindly, therefore, give my bee-mind a place at Your lotus feet, which are the resources for all transcendental honey. I know that even big demigods like Brahmā do not see the rays of the nails of Your lotus feet, even though they are engaged in deep meditation for years together. Still, O infallible one, my ambition is such, for You are very merciful to your surrendered devotees. O Mādhava, I know also that I have no genuine devotion for the service of Your lotus feet, but because Your Lordship is inconceivably powerful, You can do what is impossible to be done. Your lotus feet can deride even the nectar of the heavenly kingdom, and therefore I am very much attracted by them. O supreme eternal, please, therefore, let my mind be fixed at Your lotus feet so that eternally I may be able to relish the taste of Your transcendental service."
There is no question about being Happy or Sad - Gita 5:20
Gist: On attainment of either the desirable or undesirable, a spiritual aspirant must neither be happy, nor sad within. He is neither attached to the desirable, nor averse to the undesirable. He who realizes the true essence of the Self (Soul) and the modes of nature, knows that he is not the doer, and thus there is no question about him (the self) being happy or sad.
"Na prahrshyetpriyam paapya nodvijetpraapya chaapriyam
Sthirabuddhorasammu dho brahmavid brahmani sthitah." (Gita 5:20)
"He who neither rejoices on obtaining what is pleasant, nor grieves on receiving that which is unpleasant and who is of the firm understanding and unbewildered, such a knower of God vests in God" (Gita 5:20)
Let us focus on the first line - "Na prahrshyetpriyam paapya nodvijetpraapya chaapriyam" - To get favorable things, objects, beings, incidents, circumstances, body, senses, mind, principles, caste, creed, scriptures is called attaining that which is agreeable or desirable(priya) . To get anything contrary to that is getting what is disagreeable or undesirable (apriya).
On attainment of either the desirable or undesirable, a spiritual aspirant must neither be happy nor sad within (in the inner faculty, conscience). Having knowledge of both that which is desirable and undesirable, he is neither attached to the desirable, nor averse to the undesirable. Here the mistake is more about impressions being made on the inner faculty by being happy and sad from the desirable and undesirable. Mere knowledge of agreeable and disagreeable is not a flaw, if one remains free from joy or grief.
Knowledge of agreeable and disagreeable is in the inner faculty (antahkaran) , but the one who gets happy and sad is a doer. Though all actions are performed by the modes of nature, yet he whose mind is deluded by egoism thinks "I am the Doer," and feels happy and sad. But he who realizes the true essence of the Self (Soul) and the modes of nature, understands that it is the modes (gunas) which are acting on the modes (Gita 3:28). He knows that he is not the doer, and thus there is no question for him (the self) to be happy or sad.
Bhagavad Gita Chapter 18 Texts 36 to 40 informs us about happiness:
O best of the Bharatas, now please hear from Me about the three kinds of happiness which the conditioned soul enjoys, and by which he sometimes comes to the end of all distress. That which in the beginning may be just like poison but at the end is just like nectar and which awakens one to self-realization is said to be happiness in the mode of goodness.
That happiness which is derived from contact of the senses with their objects and which appears like nectar at first but poison at the end is said to be of the nature of passion.
And that happiness which is blind to self-realization, which is delusion from beginning to end and which arises from sleep, laziness and illusion is said to be of the nature of ignorance.
From the above one can deduce that "as is the state of the mind so is the nature of one's happiness." Thus, seeking happiness from another person (or mind) will fail. Bhagavan tells us about the Dull, the Passionate, and the Good mind.
To the Dull mind, living in an utterly deluded world of make-believe is happiness. He lives in an artificial state of bliss.The constancy because of which a foolish man does not abandon anger, violence, fear, grief, depression, lust, possessiveness, egoism, and also arrogance and conceit, that fortitude, O Partha. is Tamasic
(Dull).
To the rajasic nature of mind, happiness consists of sensations and excitements - at first it is like nectar, but in the end it becomes poison. The fortitude, O Arjuna, by which one holds fast to duty, pleasure and wealth, from attachment and craving for the fruits-of-action, that fortitude, O Partha, is rajasic (Passionate) .
For the Good or sattvic state of mind, the happiness is like poison at first then like nectar at the end. When the happiness is unconscious then it results in a condition of bliss. Bliss is not of the mind, but in the supreme state of unconsciousness the experience of bliss comes. One is detached from that which appears to be poison. The man of sattvic quality is detached in the midst of favorable conditions of life and so in the end he is supremely happy. It is happiness born of detachment and not dependent on another human being.
Seeking happiness from others results in disappointment and unhappiness. Cultivate and nurture the sattvic state of mind that will lead to Eternal Happiness - the happiness that endures, not the one that decays in the process of time or is dependent on the whims and fancies of others..
How can we develop this Sattvic state of mind? One has to return to the original rather than the acquired nature of the mind. We must observe the mind by conducting an inquiry into the processes of the mind that would enable us to see how we have built up an acquired nature due to which we are caught up in the Para-dharna and have lost sight of the Svadharma.
To become aware of the acquired nature is to start the process of being free from it. To discover one's original nature is to be initiated into a new dimension of living, a revolutionary event in the journey of life. By the Grace of Bhagavan, I will have a another post on this topic in the next day or two.
That happiness which is derived from contact of the senses with their objects and which appears like nectar at first but poison at the end is said to be of the nature of passion.
And that happiness which is blind to self-realization, which is delusion from beginning to end and which arises from sleep, laziness and illusion is said to be of the nature of ignorance.
From the above one can deduce that "as is the state of the mind so is the nature of one's happiness." Thus, seeking happiness from another person (or mind) will fail. Bhagavan tells us about the Dull, the Passionate, and the Good mind.
To the Dull mind, living in an utterly deluded world of make-believe is happiness. He lives in an artificial state of bliss.The constancy because of which a foolish man does not abandon anger, violence, fear, grief, depression, lust, possessiveness, egoism, and also arrogance and conceit, that fortitude, O Partha. is Tamasic
(Dull).
To the rajasic nature of mind, happiness consists of sensations and excitements - at first it is like nectar, but in the end it becomes poison. The fortitude, O Arjuna, by which one holds fast to duty, pleasure and wealth, from attachment and craving for the fruits-of-action, that fortitude, O Partha, is rajasic (Passionate) .
For the Good or sattvic state of mind, the happiness is like poison at first then like nectar at the end. When the happiness is unconscious then it results in a condition of bliss. Bliss is not of the mind, but in the supreme state of unconsciousness the experience of bliss comes. One is detached from that which appears to be poison. The man of sattvic quality is detached in the midst of favorable conditions of life and so in the end he is supremely happy. It is happiness born of detachment and not dependent on another human being.
Seeking happiness from others results in disappointment and unhappiness. Cultivate and nurture the sattvic state of mind that will lead to Eternal Happiness - the happiness that endures, not the one that decays in the process of time or is dependent on the whims and fancies of others..
How can we develop this Sattvic state of mind? One has to return to the original rather than the acquired nature of the mind. We must observe the mind by conducting an inquiry into the processes of the mind that would enable us to see how we have built up an acquired nature due to which we are caught up in the Para-dharna and have lost sight of the Svadharma.
To become aware of the acquired nature is to start the process of being free from it. To discover one's original nature is to be initiated into a new dimension of living, a revolutionary event in the journey of life. By the Grace of Bhagavan, I will have a another post on this topic in the next day or two.
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