Gita Verse 474

Swami Sri Atmananda Posted on by

Omm Namo Bhagavate

Verse 474 says that the hardships for those whose minds are fixed on the unmanifest are greater, because the goal to realize the unmanifest is difficult for the embodied beings. What type of hardship is referred to here? Hardship may be faced for material expansion, and can also be experienced in spiritual emancipation—this is the hardship we are talking about.

Hardship is inevitable in life, whether in regard to expansion in the material plane or striving in the spiritual plane. But the hardship that is referred to here is a comparative statement. It is talking of hardship to expand spirit. The question is why the hardship for those who are in the manifest path is relatively less. What is referred to here as the unmanifest and what is the manifest? This is the key concept to be clarified first. As I have understood it, the words manifest and unmanifest refer to the path itself, and whether or not the path is visible to you or not. If the path is visible and you are able to walk towards your goal, that is the concept we are discussing. If the path is not visible but the awakening has come and aspiration is there, then the yogi desperately searches for a track.

We have seen many people psychically awakened, spiritually awakened. They are ethical beings, moral beings, ideal beings, they have true aspiration and a great deal of sense control, but even then they are not making progress in yoga. I have gone through this stage myself. Outer recognition had already come that I was a great yogi, but actually that was just self-deception. Outer recognition will come the moment you deviate just a little from the ordinary life. People will give you recognition that you are a yogi, a seeker, a devotee, but that is only “empty vessels sound much.”

Real progress can be felt within, and real progress will not come until the path is found. Before the path is found we simply put some new conditioning on our mind. Why? Because X or Y has said this, or in so and so book it is explained like that. This is the time when we talk more about yoga than about our experience as yogis, and we become philosophical. Yoga is not philosophy; yoga is direct experience, and direct experience will never come until one has found the path. If the path is manifest, the path is visible. If the path is unmanifest, it is not visible. A path can never be visible if a guide is not visible to you.

The symptom of a true yogi in the Gita path is discrimination between the striving in the zone of self versus the striving in the zone of non-self. Non-self is the zone of our mind and vital. Anything that we strive to achieve in our mind or vital zone is all striving for attainment in the world of non-self.  Building a house is not a spiritual activity. But if a person is striving to build a house where he can stay for the sake of sadhana, or where seekers can come and stay for the sake of yoga, then the whole concept is different. That is striving for the sake of expansion of the awareness of the self.

Gita yoga is first the yoga of discrimination. Remaining in this action field we discriminate which action can expand our awareness and which can throw us again into the pool of experience. Any action that throws us to the pool of experience is not yoga.

A yogi in the Gita path to whom the path is visible, that means for whom the path is manifest, will always discriminate and will withdraw from those actions that are likely to cloud his awareness. Discrimination is an attribute, a visible symptom. A yogi to whom the path is visible, his actions are also visible. A yogi to whom the path is not visible, his actions are in the zone of mind and vital and senses.

How can we recognize a yogi who is really on the path of yoga? This is the question that was asked by Arjuna in the second step of the journey, in Verse 101: what are the signs and symptoms of one who has attained equanimity? Equanimity is a state in which your intellect is stabilized in the awareness of the being. Mind may not be stabilized, but intellect is stabilized. When the intellect is linked with the being, the person can always discriminate. There will be no impulsive or compulsive action, there will only be conscious action. This is the reason discrimination becomes a permanent companion to one to whom the path is visible. That is referred to here.

If the path is visible to you, there is no chance of you becoming derailed from yoga. But in day-to-day life, even great yogis perform hundreds of actions that do not take them towards the goal, that push them away from the goal or create a stumbling block for progress.

If the path is visible, the guide is visible. In Gita yoga, the guide is not only the guru, it is the scripture itself. Guru is simply a role model, someone to whom you can look for guidance, because that someone is himself an embodiment of the scripture that you are following.

This is the reason Krishna said to Arjuna, “Therefore let the scripture be your guide,” because you are in the field of action, but the guru by definition is someone who is beyond action, gunatita. All the actions that are necessary for you are unnecessary for one who has transcended the gunas. This is to be remembered.

Guru is one who is always established in the state of unity consciousness. He simply responds to your action; he does not throw you into action. He does not react to your errors and omissions in action unless you are really linked. If you are linked, the guru sometimes shows approval and sometimes disapproval. But if you are not linked at all, you may be living with him, but there will be no response. Guru in Gita is not one who is initiating action in you. Actions are being initiated in you through prakriti and the guru is a witness to this play and interplay of the gunas in your form.

When the path is visible, it means you have the scripture, you know its meaning, you have discrimination, are proceeding with confidence and there is a role model to whom you look when you are confused. Gita was revealed in the battlefield. Who was fighting the battle–Krishna or Arjuna? Arjuna was fighting, not Krishna. The guru does not fight any battle and does not do any sadhana because he has nowhere to reach. But just as Krishna was with Arjuna, the guide is with the seeker, the traveler. The seeker has to make progress and the guide will respond when the seeker needs it. Krishna will take the chariot only if Arjuna needs it. That’s why Arjuna said, “Take my chariot to the middle of the armies. Keep there until I have surveyed all those who have come to fight against me.” And Krishna did it.

If the seeker is not making forward progress, the guide has no compulsion of pushing him forward. This pushing forward occurs only if surrender has come. Then the guide has a role to push the seeker beyond.

I have thought over this for decades. Is a human guide necessary? My conclusion is absolutely, one hundred percent yes. Otherwise yoga becomes only philosophy and psychic romance. If you do not have someone to look toward, someone who is watching you and your action, and to whom you are answerable as far as your sadhana is concerned, no human being can really transcend the veil of maya.

Those who think that reading books, living in ashrams, and conducting seminars, conferences and study circles can give them enlightenment are simply chasing a mirage. They can never, never really transcend the veil. This is my experience, and the experience of all the enlightened beings.

The manifest concept here means, first the path must be visible. If the path is visible your scripture must have been found. If you have found your scripture, you must also have found your guide. If you have found your guide, then you have to ask yourself whether the guide is a living being or someone who lived once upon a time. If the guide is someone who lived once upon a time, then be sure you can never transcend maya. You can attain God-realization, but you can never transcend maya. It is not possible at all.

This is the reason Arjuna needs a Krishna, and the Krishna needs to be available to Arjuna. I have been with dozen of enlightened beings, but they were not available to me. I could not share anything–my turbulence, confusion, or revolt–and I could not release my anger to the master. So I could not make real progress. Real progress comes only when you have a form available, because you are still formal. You have not transcended the form. You still consider yourself to be a body and a mind. Until you have transcended that formal limitation, you need a form with whom you can act, to whom you can react and with whom you can interact. This is the most important concept that is explained in the twelfth chapter. In no other chapter has it been so vividly revealed.

A form is a must to transcend the veil, but a form is not a compulsive necessity to merge in the ocean of becoming. Many can reach the state of God-realization, but not all those who reach God-realization transcend the veil of prakriti. Manushyänäm sahasreshu kashchid yatatisiddhaye, out of a thousand who strive and attain, one knows me in reality. That message was very clear and profound. Those who follow the path of the unmanifest face greater hardship because they carry the possibility of going round and round and round, and the life comes to an end before the veil is transcended. They commit the same mistake again and again, not only in the material plane but also in the spiritual life because they do not have a formal guide who can shout and scream at them, warn them, punish them and impose on them. That is the implied meaning here.

Their hardship is also greater because they are still with the body. They consider the body to be real, but when the veil is transcended the body will never appear to be real. We all talk about the body as perishable: the doctor who treats you will advise you to take care of your body, and the enlightened master who has transcended the body also advises you to take care of your body, but the advice of the two persons is for different reasons. The doctor knows that with a sick body you cannot enjoy life, but the enlightened master knows that without the body the soul cannot reach its goal. An enlightened sadguru always emphasizes taking care of your body, not to enjoy life, but to transcend and transform life, and to manifest life as a channel of Divine. If you cannot take care of your health you cannot do yoga.

One can never transcend the body until one has transcended prakriti, because body is a product of the five components of prakriti: earth, water, fire, air and ether. Body is a product of these five elements and these five elements are components of prakriti. Only when you transcend prakriti will you not be identified with the body. Transcendence will never come without merger; merger will never come without realization; realization will never come without sense control; sense control will never come without determination; and determination will never come without aspiration. This is the reason aspiration is the key.

Sri Aurobindo has made the whole concept so simple. Aspiration is the key, because only aspiration can give you determination. Determination can give you strength for discrimination. Discrimination will enable you to be perfectly in the field of action, and only through action jnana, or knowledge, will come. Jnana will burn your karma and you will attain sannyasa (renunciation), sannyasa will lead you to samadhi, and in samadhi you will attain the state of the being. From the being to the becoming, the journey will be smooth and you become a part of the becoming. You, the bubble, wither away in the ocean itself. That’s the merger.

After withering away in the ocean as bubble, you, the bubble, again come out as a wave. You are part of the ocean but you are also not the ocean. That’s the state of the awareness of every enlightened being. As wave you manifest not you, but the beauty and the vastness of the ocean. A time comes when you reach this awareness: game is over, job is done, now let me withdraw, let me go back to the state of the absolute, the Brahman, from which I came. That’s the eighteenth chapter.

This is how the journey goes on in each individual form, and the manifest universe continues, because there are millions of sparks in millions of forms. That is why it is called the eternal, imperishable. What is perishable is the form through which the spark proceeds towards the goal. The spark is imperishable and the play is also imperishable, the eternal play. This is the eternal tree of Chapter Fifteen.

What is necessary is aspiration, and aspiration will never come until sattwa is sustained in your system. This is where I am taking Sri Aurobindo’s yoga deeper to its root. Integral Yoga begins with aspiration: “aspiration that calls from below and the grace that answers from above.” But where does aspiration come from? Can a tamasic person have aspiration? Can a rajasic person? No. Aspiration will come only if sattwa is maintained, sustained, nourished, and protected.

We are coming back to square one, back to the origin of traditional yoga that speaks of abhyasa (practice), jama, niyama (restraint), asana (posture) and pranayama (breath control). We are back to the point of origin, whereby nothing will happen in yoga without conscious sense control and mind control. That is the first step of the ashtanga yoga, the eightfold yoga. Jama is mind control and sense control. You have to practice these. You may be tamasic or rajasic in nature, but you have to impose these on yourself in the beginning to accumulate sattwa. When sattwa accumulates, aspiration rises. Then the journey is possible.

Masters come and go, but the sanatana path, this eternal path remains always. New masters use new terminology to explain the same concept in a different way so that people of that era can understand it, but to say that it was not there and X or Y explained it for the first time is the height of foolishness. Nothing new can ever be told; nothing new can ever be shown. We explain the same concept from a different angle.

When Buddhism became widespread what was the slogan? “Desire is the root of all evil. If you want to get rid of sorrow you must stop desiring.” The whole generation went mad with it, but nobody asked this question to Buddha, “We understand that sorrow comes from desire, but wherefrom does desire itself come?” Nobody asked that because the whole society was so tormented with desire that they all went mad with this concept. This is the reason another revival came. Sankaracharyaji came and asked this very fundamental question, “Wherefrom desire comes? Wherefrom sorrow comes, okay, Buddha has explained, but tell wherefrom desire comes.” Again back to Veda. This is how the play goes on and on and on.

I have given you the scripture that is not a compilation of the advice of a saint or seer or master. This scripture was revealed, not written. He who revealed it said, “It is revealed through me.” He has never said, “I am revealing it.” “Revealed through me. It was there, it will be there; only due to the impact of time it gets lost and it is revealed again and again. For that purpose I come, you come, we all come, because we are called and chosen.”

That’s the path we have found, the path that we are striving to make visible to those who want to walk through it. That is our mission. Our mission is not to create ashrams and centers or to create enlightened beings and seers. Our mission is, we should live life as explained in Gita. We should be living embodiments of Gita, so that through us this light will be transmitted to the masses. I am not talking of making X or Y or Z a guru or an enlightened being or a super-guide. Our mission is to make this path visible to mankind. For that purpose we have come. We can accomplish our mission only if we become the living embodiments of this pure wisdom. That’s our goal.

Neither enlightenment nor Self-realization and never God-realization are our aim, because we are the Being right from birth. We are Divine much before we know it. We are here not to gain anything, because everything here is already ours. This creation is ours. And we should not be worried to preserve something, because we are beyond gain and loss. There is no gain for us, and because there is no gain there is also no loss for us. If we can simply maintain this awareness, and we are determined to live the life and respond to prakriti the way prakriti wants to be responded, through our action knowledge will be manifested, through our reaction love will be manifested, and through our response truth will be manifested. That’s the mission of which I am talking.

That is what is visible to me, and some people are also able to see this, even if for them it is coming and going. This is the reason I say the hardship for those who are able to see the path is much less. You have found the scripture that can constantly speak to you. You have found a guide at whom you can look and compare your own state. And finally, you have a group; you are not alone. Arjuna was not alone in the battlefield. He had millions of people with him. Their number may have been fewer in comparison to the army of the Kauravas, but Arjuna was not alone. He had many commanders at his side, and many soldiers to fight and die for him. So also you all are a group. You are not a lone soldier; you are one among many soldiers and you should keep fighting, keep going, never to lose hope, never to feel left out, and never to run away from this battle to manifest the mission.

[From an April 2013 Interaction at Satyachetana Ashram, Tiruvannamalai, India.]

 

Inner Renunciation

Swami Sri Atmananda Posted on by
Copyright 2011 Satyachetana

Omm Namo Bhagavate

Sannyasa of Gita is not outer renunciation of matter. Gita neither approves nor recommends any type of outer renunciation. Outer renunciation is itself an antithesis of Gita’s philosophy. If nothing belongs to you, what is there to be renounced?

You are Brahman, you are atman, you are awareness. You have entered into this zone of experience to experience the objects. Whatever you will experience, whatever you are experiencing, and whatever is left for you to experience, nothing belongs to you. Everything belongs to prakriti. So how can you renounce that which does not belong to you? If something belongs to you, you can say, “Okay, I am renouncing.” But if it is not yours and you say, “I am renouncing,” that is not only ignorance, it is hypocrisy.

One who is ignorant says, “I have renounced,” and one who is foolish says, “I will renounce.” But one who is learned never says, “I will renounce,” because he knows through his conceptual clarity that, “I am Brahman, I am Atman, I have entered into the prakriti. I am awareness. Out of my self-will I entered into this zone of experience. Nothing belongs to me. So what is there for me to renounce?” With this clarity he proceeds to attain wisdom, and as much he becomes wise so much he knows that there is really nothing to be renounced. Gita yoga is neither for the ignorant nor for the foolish. It is for the wise.

What actually happens is that when this Brahman, this atman, enters into the zone of experience and starts experiencing prakriti, or matter, due to constant linkage with experience, slowly the being starts forgetting its own nature, which is awareness. As much as the awareness becomes reduced, so much the identification with experience and the object of experience increases. Then a time comes when the awareness is completely gone and the jiva begins to feel and think, “This is mine.”

The problem is that the yogi has accumulated so much samskara and so much karma, and is carrying so much identification, and needs to get rid of these. Getting rid of identification is called renunciation in Gita yoga: not getting rid of outer matter but getting rid of inner identification.

Gita’s renunciation is twofold. First is getting rid of the experience. Second is getting rid of the object. Not vice versa. First is getting rid of the experience, so don’t chase experience. If you have gone to your friend’s house and your friend has served you a delicious dish to eat and you like the taste and you feel, “Oh, if I will return to his house he will again give me this,” then you find excuses how to go again and you call the friend. That means you are creating karma, and chasing the experience. You want that experience to come you again through your effort, whereas the natural law says let experience come to you, rather than you going to the experience. That’s Gita yoga.

Let it come to you without putting any effort, because you are the lord of matter. Why should you chase it? Let it come and when it does, experience it with moderation—so that it will not allow your awareness to be swallowed up. Be conscious of how much you can experience so that you are not losing your awareness that, “I am Brahman, I am Atman, I am here to experience; I am the subject, let me not become the object.” Remain as subject; never become the object whereby someone or something else will experience you. You are the experiencer. That is what the last verse of the fifth chapter of Gita says: “I am the experiencer, I am the enjoyer.” How can you become the enjoyer, how can you become the experiencer if you are the object of experience? Don’t become the object; remain always as the subject. If you do that, if you remain as the experiencer, then the object will come to you automatically; you need not run towards the object. This is the secret of Gita yoga.

Renunciation of Gita is inner. You get rid of the inner identification with the objects of experience, with persons, and with places. Be delinked without making any formal announcement. Then your inner journey will not be challenged from the outer world. But if you begin by making announcements, challenges will come from all around. This is the reason first you have to acquire knowledge; you should get jnana, and wherefrom you get jnana? Not by reading books but from the jnanis. That is what was told in Verse 196.

Receive this from enlightened masters, not by reading books. It won’t come to you that way. Reading will only give you more information, not more knowledge, because knowledge cannot be acquired, it can only be attained. It is there in you, so receive this jnana from the enlightened masters. When you receive it you can know how to burn your karma, your samskara, your identification, as explained in Verse 197. With this jnana you will be able to see clearly and you will begin to see you, the Self.

These are all attainments before coming to the stage of sannyasa in the fifth step of Gita. One can know from looking within what stage of Gita he has reached. “Am I in dejection stage or am I in discrimination, have I come to the action stage, or have I climbed to the knowledge stage?” This is how the yogi should constantly ask himself.

At what stage of sadhana are you?

You cannot climb to the fifth step by lifting both of your legs at the same time. You will fall. But by lifting one foot to sannyasa while the other foot stands firmly on jnana, you can climb. This is the way. Jnana has to come first. With the help of this jnana, the yogi will begin to practice sannyasa. This practice must first be inner because yoga is inner, not outer. Ascetic bareness, compulsive asceticism and compulsory self-denial, Gita says all these will lead to self-deception and hypocrisy. If you have not acquired anything why do you bother to renounce anything? Even if you have acquired something, because now you are having jnana and you know nothing will go with you, why do you waste your time by outer renunciation? “To whom shall I give this house, to whom shall I give all my money, to whom shall I give all these things that I have acquired?” This is itself the proof that still the “you” is active, not the He.

Renunciation is a practice, not an action. Practice renunciation. It is not as easy as simply changing from your white cloth to an ocher robe and you become a sannyasi. That is hypocrisy. It is not so easy that simply you leave your wife and children and just go and stay in an ashram and say, “I am a sannyasi.” That is bogus. Those who do this create another samsara. Instead, allow the identifications to fall from within. When you are linked with You, all that is not You will automatically fall apart. Be linked with You. This is such a simple, profound truth. I can’t express the joy that I began to feel within when I conceptually understood it.

The jnani Arjuna committed this same mistake that all the yogis commit. He suddenly wanted to climb to sannyasa with both of his feet. When he found it is not possible he got confused and asked in Verse 205, “Krishna, you are praising renunciation and also you are praising action in material plane. I am confused. You are saying, be on matter and respond to matter and perform action as a yogi, and then you are saying renounce action and be a jnani. Tell me therefore, O Lord, O Guide, O Guru, O Master, precisely which one is better for me.”

Why this confusion is coming to Arjuna? Arjuna who asked this question is no other than you. You are Arjuna. Arjuna literally means one who is awakened to the inner call. Every seeker is Arjuna and every seeker commits the same mistake as Arjuna. When they listen of karma, they say, “I will be a karma yogi.” When they listen to the jnana they say, “Now I will get rid of this karma. I will simply stay with Swamiji or be in the ashram and listen to discourses—that will take me away to the highest state.” And when they come in contact with a bhakta, “Oh, twenty-four hours a day I will only chant God’s name.” Then when they come across with a yogi and they find, “He is in the bliss of meditation,” they sit and close their eyes thinking they can enter into samadhi.

When a child is with his father he want to imitate the father, when the child is with the mother he wants to imitate the mother, when the child with friends he wants to imitate the friends. But yoga is not a child’s play, it is an adult’s resolve. If the seeker does not have the resolve of an adult, nothing is attainable in yoga. This is the reason Gita yoga was revealed to an adult who had gone through all the experiences of life: fame as well as defamation, success as well as failure, ecstasy and depression, anger and infatuation, love and repulsion. He was having ambition and desire, and also his psychic bliss; he was having inner silence and also the outer noise and nuisance. He had experienced everything, and only an adult can do that, not a child.

This is the mighty yoga; this is for the warriors, not the cowards. A coward is one who runs away from the battlefield without fighting. So in yoga, a coward is one who runs away from the challenges of yoga the moment he or she feels “Oh, it will rob me of my ecstasy, it will rob me of my indulgence, it will rob me from my socializing, it will rob me from my relationship.” Gita yoga is not for this type of person.

Be grounded on jnana, then attempt sannyasa. As I said, jnana is not bookish knowledge, it is getting linked with the guru in consciousness always. Jnana is not reading volumes of books, not listening to discourses of a half a dozen seers or masters. Jnana is the link; it constantly flows as water constantly flows through the pipe, miles and miles so that the moment you open the tap, water flows down. Water is already there in the pipe, so you have to simply open the tap, then your bucket will be full. If water is not there in the pipe, you can’t fill the bucket.

The link with the guru must be constant and this link should be inner not outer. Jnana is compared with a burning lamp, and to keep the lamp continually burning, the link with the guru must be constant. That inner link is not an outer relationship. Outer relationship is necessary for social life: you meet your parents regularly, and you maintain your friendships. These are all outer relationships that have to be maintained. But the inner link you have to sustain, not maintain. In Verse 196, Gita says there are three ways you can sustain it. First is inner humility. Be humble whenever you think of your master. Just be humble because he is so vast and you are so limited, he is infinite and you are finite, he is the ocean you are the drop. This awareness is called the state of humility. If you are thinking of your master and such awareness is not coming, then you have not understood what is humility. Humility is not an outer posture or prostration; humility is an inner state of consciousness of feeling small in comparison to the biggest. If that quality is there in you, your relationship with the master is sustained.

Second is self-inquiry, which means, let the soul in you ask you the question, “Are you on the right path? You want to do this but are you sure it will not swallow your awareness?” This constant questioning will come because someone is there within who is constantly asking you, and he who is asking is the guru, because the guru is the embodiment of jnana only. If he is seated in your heart, he will constantly keep asking you whenever you are going out of the track, like, “Okay, I understand he is your friend but are you not entering into gossip? Maintain your relationship but don’t lose your awareness.” This type of thought will come to you. That means your link with the guru is sustained.

Third is to render service. This does not mean rendering service to your neighbor or friend. Render service to one who is on the same path. Render service to one who has attained higher awareness than you. Render service to to one who is awakened, to one who is carrying the awakening, or to one who is struggling to sustain his awakening. This is called seva. Not by cooking food, nor by massaging their feet nor by cleaning their room. These are all outer. These are needed but for maintenance, not for sustenance. Whereas Gita recommends seva for sustenance, not maintenance. This type of seva does not require money, nor a chunk of your time. It can be rendered even through consciousness by transmitting thought waves, by transmitting love, by simply whispering a few words of wisdom, or by simply sending an ounce of your heart’s love. That is seva to a seeker, a seer, an awakened being and one who  struggles to sustain his awareness.

When you are rendering seva to one who is struggling to sustain his awareness, you are actually rendering seva to the enlightened master, because enlightened beings remain in the body only to raise some people, and liberate some souls to the state of pure awareness. By assisting them in their mission you are actually rendering seva to them. But people don’t understand this. They consider that seva means they must cook the food, prepare the bed and carry the luggage. That is not seva because those who are truly enlightened, they don’t remain in the body; they only function through the body. They are not aware of their body; they simply allow you to render seva to their form out of their compassion for you, because you are at that level. Only by allowing you to do what you are feeling to do, they give you the chance to be lifted up.

Those who demand seva, those who expect seva from others, they have not become light; they are still in search of light. Those who demand love, those who expect love, those who run towards love, those who crave love, they have not become love itself, they are still searching for it. The same goes for jnana. Those who are reading books to know, or listening to know, or who are asking to be explained, they are not the manifest embodiments of jnana. They are still searching, still acquiring. But those who are acquiring and searching can never transmit it. To transmit you have to be that. The sun must be light itself then only it can transmit light. The fire must be heat itself then only it can transmit heat. In the same way, a person has to be love itself then only he can transmit love. A person has to be jnana itself then only he can transmit jnana.

To be linked with such enlightened beings is the first step, and when you are attempting sannyasa your link with the jnana, and the source of jnana—the guru–must be intact and solid. Otherwise you cannot enter into sannyasa.

Why are people not drawn to Gita? It is because guides are not available to transmit Gita. If guides will be available then the whole world will be drawn to Gita because this is supreme knowledge, supreme wisdom, and the eternal path. All other paths are only subways and by-lanes. This is the only freeway.

[From an August 2013 Interaction at the Divine Mission Center in Sacramento, USA.]

 

Creative Intelligence

Swami Sri Atmananda Posted on by

Omm Namo Bhagavate

Bhagavad Gita verse 103:

duhkheshvanudvigna-manäh sukheshu vigata-sprihah
vïta-räga-bhaya-krodhah sthitadhïr munir uchyate. [2.56]

Arjuna has asked how can one know who has attained the state of sthitaprajña.  Sthitaprajña we have translated as the state of equanimity.  One whose prajña is fully established in the being is sthitaprajña.

Prajña here is not the surface intellect.  I have given a new term to this: creative intelligence, that intelligence which decides what is right for a seeker.  This creative intelligence, this prajña, is not found in those who are leading a gross material life.  They are just working from the plane of normal human intelligence.  Animals and birds also have some type of intelligence.  Human beings have higher intelligence but that intelligence is used for interacting in the gross material plane.  The animals and birds use their intelligence for living.

Those who are only identified with gross living have no higher purpose.  Higher purpose does not mean to become a scientist or a professor or an engineer.  It means to establish a connection with the atman within, the paramatman within, and to dedicate life to living with spirit, living for spirit.  The lower purpose is to lead a happy life in the material plane.

The true purpose of life is to live for God.  How can one move towards that purpose—who gives guidance?  It is the higher intelligence, the creative intelligence, not the surface mind, that guides the seeker to be able to discriminate between gross human life and elevated spiritual life; it is not discrimination between gross human life and dignified human life.

Who arrives at this conclusion?  In the human system there are several components: the gross physical that is dominated by the senses; the lower mental that is dominated by thought and memory; the lower vital that is characterized by feeling and impulse; and the higher vital that is characterized by aspiration for a spiritual life, ambition for spiritual realization and strength to pursue the spiritual goal.  Then there is the higher mental that is full of godly thought and godly intuitive memory; the sadhana that is done from a previous life is higher mental.  Finally there is the psychic.

The intelligence that gives the conclusion for gross human life is just above the lower mental, but the divine intelligence that guides human beings to arrive at a conclusion for a higher spiritual life is above the higher mental.  The intelligence forms the conclusion and a yogi goes by that conclusion and knows what to do, and how and when to do it.

Human intelligence is resting on the mind which is a monkey, jumping every moment, but the divine intelligence is linked with the being within, which is constant.  The Blessed Lord is referring to that when Arjuna asked, “Tell me, Lord, how can I know who is that person who has attained stable intelligence?”  If the intelligence is stable, actions will be transparent, and there will be no confusion and no contamination from the world of prakriti.

The Lord explains that the one who is established in equanimity, whose intelligence has become stable, is not perturbed by dukha, sorrow.  What type of sorrow is referred to here?  This is the second chapter of Gita; the yogi has just entered into the second step in sadhana.  We have divided each chapter into a step, and as the yogi ascends to higher and higher steps of sadhana, he becomes more stable.  Here at the second step of sadhana, the yogi has gone through dejection and is now learning discrimination through buddhi yoga.  The Lord is revealing characteristics of the person who is capable to discriminate: what are his inner experiences, what are his outer symptoms, how can a beginner know whether he is able to discriminate between Self and non-Self, matter and spirit, sadhana and indulgence—how can he know that he has come to that stage?  The Lord is also explaining how Arjuna can know from the outer symptoms that a person is established in the state of equanimity.  Both are necessary in yoga, because if the yogi is able to know from inner experience what are the signs of equanimity it will give him strength and inspiration to proceed further.  The outer symptoms are necessary because the yogi of Gita does not live in a forest or in a cave and has not renounced samsara.

The yogi of Gita is within samsara.  That is why Gita was revealed in the battlefield, not in the ashram of a hermit or a saint.  Very symbolic.  The battlefield refers to the turbulent, chaotic life in samsara.  Arjuna was a householder who was pushed by prakriti to perform his ordained duty as a kshatriya.  Gita is the yoga of the common man living in society, facing this turbulent, chaotic world of samsara, so how can the yogi perform sadhana?  If he is called and chosen and awakened, remaining in samsara and the material-social world of relationship, how can he proceed?  That guideline is given in the yoga of Gita.

It is necessary for Arjuna the seeker to know the outer symptoms, because if he is able to recognize a person by his outer symptoms—“Yes, here is a person of equanimity, here is a person who is able to clearly discriminate between sadhana and enjoyment, Self and non-Self”—then he will establish a connection with such a person.  Although yogis live together, actually they live in themselves.  So in the outer social life, if the yogi is able to recognize who is a seeker like him, who is on the same path like him, then at the time of confusion he can seek guidance from such a person.  He can share his experiences with such a person.  The common man will not understand what is happening to him.

This is the reason the Lord is explaining the inner experiences and outer symptoms of a yogi on the path of Gita.  The Lord says, duhkheshvanudvigna-manäh, such a yogi is not perturbed when he is facing a situation of sorrow.    Sorrow is of several types.  It can be psychic, that is adyatmic dukha, or vital, pranic.  When someone in the family dies, when a friend meets an accident, when something is stolen which you like very much, when someone shouts at you without your having any fault and you cry, you get angry—these are the examples of sorrow in the vital plane.  Sorrow in the physical plane is called pain.  Sorrow in the mental plane is depression, and when it touches the vital it becomes intense.  Depression first begins in the vital then comes to the mental.  When the mind is overpowered by this depression that is originating from the vital, a person feels suicidal tendency.  When there is sorrow in the psychic plane, you cry without any reason.

What type of sorrow is the Lord referring to here?  Remember the yogi is in the second step of sadhana.  This yogi is awakened to the inner reality, but does not know it through mind yet.  He will know it only when the Lord will reveal it, when the guru will reveal it.  The guru of Gita has not revealed it to Arjuna at this point, so he does not know that he is awakened.

If we see from the point of yoga this is the second chapter, and yoga begins with ascension of kundalini, the chit.  Chit from the muladhara, the first chakra has come to the swadhisthan, the second chakra.  When the kundalini is in the muladhara, man lives the life of an animal, only for eating, sleeping, and enjoying.  He leads a life of fear and indulgence.

When the kundalini moves towards the second chakra the person feels a pull towards sadhana and also a pull towards samsara, a pull to the world of senses and also to the world of the Self.  You cannot say what will happen to such a person.  Kundalini rises, again it falls.  This process may continue for many years.  When it comes back to muladhara, life is a life of enjoyment, running with friends to see an exciting film, to enjoy good food in a restaurant, mixing with politicians for a political speech.  Then when it rises a little, running to ashrams to listen to the saints.  That’s the movement of the chit when the chit comes three-fourths towards the second chakra.

The second chakra is where the kundalini should remain for a human being.  If it remains there, that human being will be an ideal citizen, but may not be a spiritual seeker.  Yoga, the journey towards the Self, begins only when the kundalini starts to leave the second chakra and moves towards the third chakra.

Here in the second chapter of Gita, the kundalini of Arjuna the seeker is in the second chakra, because Arjuna was an ideal citizen.  He was the best among the human beings of his time.  When the kundalini is in the second chakra the person will lead a dignified but simple life.  Now the kundalini has started moving towards the third chakra, that is, the manipuraka, the seat of the fire element, and turbulence begins.  At that time a person becomes a jijñasu, a vairagyi or he experiences dejection.

One can enter into yoga through three gates, either through jijñasa, vairagya or vishäda.  Arjuna is in the battlefield.  He has no knowledge of yoga.  He has knowledge of warfare, ethics, morality and idealism.  Suddenly, in a very unlikely environment the kundalini movement has begun vigorously.  Why?  First, Arjuna is in Kurukshetra, a very powerful and holy place.  Most importantly, Arjuna was too close to Krishna, the Supreme Being, although Krishna has not yet revealed who he is.  Arjuna knows Krishna is his cousin.  In his mental plane Arjuna might know Krishna is god, but knowing in the mental plane makes no difference.  Sadhana is not through mind; sadhana is a struggle to go beyond mind.  Sadhana is through psychic.  When psychic will overpower mind, vital and senses, then the real sadhana begins.

This Krishna in the battlefield is different from the Krishna that Arjuna had seen before.  Krishna at the battlefield is known as Yogeshwara, the Lord of yoga.  Krishna has gone to the battlefield with his full power of the Supreme Being.  Arjuna’s system was pure, his chit was in the swadhisthan, and suddenly due to the physical proximity to Krishna, the Supreme Being, and due to the impact of the holy place, Kurukshetra, Arjuna’s kundalini started moving towards the third chakra vigorously.  Swadhisthan is the water element, and manipuraka is the fire element.  If you move from water to fire, from cold to heat, what will you experience?

Everything we experience, everything we feel, everything we think, whatever we understand, it is all in the realm of chit, prakriti.  Only when we become aware—awareness without experience—that’s the realm of Sat, that’s yoga.  When you are aware, but you are not experiencing anything, that is samadhi: your individual soul is connected with the universal Soul.

Suddenly Arjuna was experiencing many things that his mind was not able to understand, which his intellect was not able to comprehend, because the chit was moving towards the third chakra.  The chit is the seat of all experience; the Sat is the seat of all awareness.  Now Arjuna is experiencing what we saw in the first chapter.  Dejection becomes total and sudden, and within that little time, the movement of kundalini from second to third was complete.  So rapid was the movement that Arjuna, the greatest warrior of his time, was not able to handle this pressure and his system collapsed.  He could not think coherently, his intellect could not guide him, his vital started feeling a tremendous turbulence between the enemies and the relations, and even his physical was weak.  He could not lift his bow, he started feeling a burning sensation and his head was reeling.  The kundalini moving from second to third chakra normally takes three years, but for Arjuna maybe it took ten or fifteen minutes.  How long does it take Arjuna to look at the enemies on the opposite side and see who they are?  He already knows who they are, so it must have taken just a couple of minutes.  Meanwhile Arjuna is less than three feet away from Krishna in the chariot, and that cosmic radiation from Krishna’s gross physical body is activating the chit within and the yoga process has started.

It was extremely painful for Arjuna because he never wanted to be a yogi.  Arjuna, the seeker, is in the second stage; he still does not know.  He has said, shishyas teham shädhi mäm  twäm prapannam, “I am thy disciple, I surrender at thy feet, guide me on the correct path.”  He might have said it, but who in Arjuna said it?  The mind in Arjuna said it, and the mind did not know why he is speaking that.  If he had known it correctly, then after saying this he would not have again argued with Krishna, because a disciple, once recognizing the sadguru, never argues.  He blindly obeys.  But we are seeing Arjuna still arguing, still trying to justify.

Arjuna is in the second stage, learning how to discriminate, not yet fully stable in discrimination.  When he is stable he will pursue the sadhana, and Krishna will teach him the secret of yogic action.  That will wait until Arjuna comes to the third stage of the journey, the third chapter of Gita, the yoga of action.  Here he is asking, “Tell me how I can know I am in the state of sthitaprajña.”  That means he has not had the experience.  “Tell me how I can recognize someone who is a sthitaprajña.”  One who has the experience will not ask what are the inner experiences, because he is having them, and one who has the inner experiences will not ask how he can recognize one who is having that experience.

The Lord says, duhkheshvanudvigna-manäh, unperturbed by sorrow.  What type of sorrow?  The sorrow in the social-material plane.  Arjuna is yet to know what is psychic sorrow.  He has not come to that stage.  This is called in our scriptural terminology adibhautic and adidaivic dukha, not adyatmic dukha.  It is not spiritual sorrow.  When such a seeker is facing sorrow, he is unperturbed because he is established in prajña, the higher intelligence.  His prajña is linked with the being, the atman.  One whose intellect is linked with the being, not with the mind or the vital, does not feel perturbed when faced with the situation of sorrow.

Next is sukheshu vigata-sprihah.  Asprihah means attraction towards happiness.  There is no attraction towards happiness or the possibility of gaining something.  You got a million dollars, you did not feel elated; you lose your million dollars, you don’t feel perturbed.  That is the state of equanimity, the state of sthitaprajña.  It is not a small attainment.  Not feeling any attraction towards happiness in the material, social, mental world, nor feeling any perturbation when faced with a situation of sorrow, loss, deprivation, defamation: that’s the state of equanimity.

Then comes the third condition, vïta-räga.  Here räga is attachment, not anger.  Vïta-räga means attachment to your near and dear ones.  Try to understand how I am interpreting.  Free from attachment does not mean detachment.  Detachment is a long way to go.  A sthitaprajña person has attained freedom from attachment.  Not getting identified with, nor being pulled towards the near and dear ones, kith and kin.

Then comes freedom from bhaya, that is, fear.  There can be three types of fear: fear of material deprivation, fear of losing honor, and fear of losing near and dear ones.  These are the material, mental, social fears, not the fear of losing your attainment.

Next is krodhah, anger.  Anger comes when desire is obstructed.  A person who has attained the state of sthitaprajña does not have anger due to material, social, mental, or vital causes.  He has irritation, but not anger.   Irritation is different than anger.  Anger remains for hours; irritation vanishes within minutes, maybe within seconds.  Anger comes when a desire is not getting fulfilled.

How many conditions is the Lord explaining?  Five conditions, and five conditions means five miles to go to the state of sthitaprajña.  Find out how many miles you have crossed and how many miles remain to be crossed to reach the goal of sthitaprajña state.

[From an Interaction in May 2010 at Satyachetana Ashram, Tiruvannamalai, India.]

Celebrating Swamiji’s Birthday

Swami Sri Atmananda Posted on by

Omm Namo Bhagavate

[Message from Satyachetana Ashram Committee]

The birthday of Swami Sri Atmanandaji Maharaj is on 18th June and many have inquired about how to observe the day. Today Swamiji shared his wish. He said that for whoever wants to observe his birthday, he requests that you read or chant any three chapters of Bhagavad Gita, and also read the fifth chapter of The Mother book.

Gita is Swamiji’s force, his life, his breath, and the foundation of his movement. Keeping Gita in heart, and trying to apply Gita to life, wherever you may be, is the greatest gift that can be given to Swamiji. About contemplation and application of the concepts to life, he has said in the past, “This is all I want!” This year, his request of those who are interested to observe his birthday is to read or chant three chapters of your choice on 18th June.

Secondly, Swamiji’s favorite chapter in The Mother, by Sri Aurobindo, is chapter five. “If you want to be a true doer of divine works…,” Swamiji quoted today with deep fondness as he shared his second wish in detail: for you to read the fifth chapter “very attentively, slowly, trying to feel, not understand, the force that is getting transmitted to you from the fifth chapter.”

Jai Gurudev. May Thy force be manifested through many.