Remaining Unperturbed-08

No two people can come so close to each other that the thought of “I” and “thou” cannot come in between them. It is impossible. Only two non-persons, non egos, can achieve this unity and oneness. And since God is a non-person, a devotee can be one with him the day he ceases to be a person, an ego. As long as a devotee remains a separate entity, fusion with God is impossible. God is not an entity as a devotee is. God’s being is like non-being; his presence is like an absence. This aspect of God is significant! And this needs to be understood in the correct sense.

We the devotees have always asked why God does not manifest himself. We forget that if he becomes manifest, meeting with him in the sense of fusion, unity, oneness, will be impossible. Such fusion is possible only with the un manifest. Devotees have always said to God, “Where are you hiding? Why don’t you manifest yourself? ” This is an utterly wrong question. If God really becomes manifest, then great wall will rise up between the seeker & the sought, and oneness will be simply impossible. 

Because God is un-manifest, a merger with God is possible. Because he is invisible and infinite like the sky, the devotee can drown himself in his being, which is good as non-being. God is visible nowhere and also is everywhere. If he becomes visible, union will be impossible. 

If there is any obstruction in the way of meeting and merging, it is from the side of devotee, not from God.

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

Remaining Unperturbed-07

Let us understand how a Sthitaprajna compares with a devotee, a bakta. A Sthitaprajna is one who has ceased to be a devotee and become bhagwan (God). And a devotee is one who is on his way to becoming God. So while a devotee is a one who is on the path, a Sthitaprajna is one who is already arrived. In other words, devotion is the path and steadied intelligence or wisdom is the destination. One who has arrived at the goal is called Sthitaprajna, and a traveler to this goal is called devotee. There is a lot in common between a devotee and a man of settled intelligence, because there is just a distance between the two.  The difference is one of journey and destination. The aspirations and expectations of a devotee turn into the achievement of the enlightened, the awakened one- and also goes beyond. And so long as a devotee does not become God himself, he will be thirsty, he will face discontentment too. 

About the distance, no matter how intimate an embrace is, a subtle separation remains between lovers. This distance can disappear only when two lovers disappear as egos and merge into each other and become totally one. Either in devotee & God or between lovers, this distance will otherwise be a distance. Whether it is a distance of an inch or of million miles, even if we reduce the distance to a thousandth part of an inch, it remains a distance nonetheless. So a devotee cannot be fully satisfied even if he remains locked in God’s embrace. He can be fulfilled only when he disappears as a devotee and becomes God himself. 

The problem is that unless we become one with the beloved, not physically but spiritually, at the level of love/ devotion, of being- there is no way for us to be satisfied and happy. This is the hardest thing to achieve.

This is not going to happen if two lovers remain tied to each other or a devotee is tied to the God. And the irony is, the nearer they are to each other, the greater their disillusionment and misery. When there was a distance between them they had hoped for heavenly happiness and joy that would come when they become closer to each other. But when they are really close, even closest to eachother, they feel disillusioned, almost cheated by their own hopes. This can be witnessed in this world among the lovers and also in devotees. The love of person to another or of devotee to God should be devoid of ego. Otherwise the aspirations are running in one direction and the efforts in another, and so frustration is inevitable. We who long to be one with God, nothing should come in between them, not even or to put it correctly not specifically the thought of “I” and “thou”. 

Let us think into this seriously to understand the ultimate reality!

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

Remaining Unperturbed-06

All duality, every division between the actor and the act, between the experience and experienced, the observer and the observed, has to disappear. If we can be totally one with the moment at hand we will have learned the art of being one with every moment that is on its way. And then miracle will happen- both pleasure and pain will chasten us, enrich us, add to our beauty and grandeur. Then both happiness and misery will be our friends and they will have equal share in making us. And when our time to leave this world will come, we will thank both in tremendous gratefulness. 

The truth is that it is not only light that creates us, darkness has an equal hand in our creation. Not only happiness enriches us, pain and suffering has equal share in building our richness. Not only life is a moment of rejoicing and celebration, death also is a great moment of bliss and festivity. It is possible only if we can live each moment totally, if we can squeeze out every drop of juice the moment posses. Then we will not be able to say that happiness is friendly pain is inimical. No, then we will gratefully accept that happiness and misery are like our own legs on which we walk, and that they are together available to us. Then we will realize how we have tried impossibly all our life to walk on one leg alone- the leg of happiness. We have to be whole when we speak, we have to be whole when we are silent. 

Disorder begins when we choose. And the chooser is separate the world of choices is unending. 

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

Remaining Unperturbed-05

Krishna is not a witness. Of course he asks Arjuna to become a witness. Krishna is all the time aware that witnessing is only a means, a transitory phase. So he also talks of moments when even witnessing will cease to be. Krishna explains both to Arjuna- the means and the end, the path & the goal. And when he speaks about unperturbed and steady, he does not speak about means but the end, the goal itself. Most of us when we interpret Gita, we make the mistake. We think that he is talking about the means, the witness. We think if some one remains a witness in happiness and pain without experiencing it, without indulging it, he will attain to the state that is unperturbed and steady. 

But when we analyse, this a wrong approach. If someone only witnesses without living it, this witnessing will become a kind of tension, disturbance, and restlessness for him. Then that person will always be in defensive, trying to protect himself from pain & happiness. To really be undisturbed, to be relaxed and peaceful, it is essential that we are not at all conscious of pain & happiness. If one is conscious it means a kind of disturbance is happening, a kind of agitation is alive and there is separation between the two- the observer and the observed. This consciousness, this separation is subtle, but it is there. So long as one continues to know that this is happiness and that is pain, he is not integrated and whole. He is not settled and steady in himself. The self has not achieved to equilibrium, peace and wisdom. It is not a Sthitaprajna. 

Let us take some time in analysing this and then we will dive deeper into the ocean of wisdom. 

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

Remaining Unperturbed-04

The witness, the observer, divides the world into subject & object, into witness & the witnessed. Therefore as long as there is a witness, duality will continue. Witnessing is the last frontier of the dual world, after which the non-dual begins. But one cannot reach the non-dual without being a witness. To be a witness means that I now give up dividing the world into many. Instead I divide it into two- the witness & the witnessed. And when I reduced the many fragments of the world to two, it will not be difficult to come to complete unity of the existence. When duality will disappear, when the observer & the observed will become one and the same, the unity in existence happens. If we succeed in becoming a witness we will soon have glimpses of one without the other, when there is neither the witness nor the witnessed, but only witnessing. 

For example, if I love someone there is one who loves and another who is loved. But if love is real, then moments will come when both the lover & the loved one will disappear, and only energy of love will abide between the two, connecting them. There will be moments when lovers disappear and only love remains. These are the moments of ‘Advaita’, the non-dual, moments of unity- the one without the other. 

In the same way there are moments of unity in witnessing too, when subject and object disappear and only the witnessing consciousness remains. It is like an ocean of energy bridging two formless entities- the witness & the witnessed- like two distant sea shores. The near shore is called “I” and the distant shore the “thou”, one is the observer & the other is the observed. Such moments will keep coming & going. And when this state achieves its fullness it will abide forever, and then even witnessing will disappear. Then we are settled in intelligence, steadied in wisdom. We are the whole, the awakened one.

In this next issue, let us discuss the Krishna & Arjuna as an example to understand this point. Namastey!

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

The Janmashtami special!

Krishna – the History 

Krishna appeared in the world in the year 3.227 B.C (on the eighth day of the second fortnight of the month of Sravana of the Visvavasu year) between the intermediary points of the beginning of one day into the next. His birth was extremely auspicious and marked with great predictions from the respected signs that the Jyotisha Vedic Astrology. As per the Shrimad Bhagavatam, Krishna had great features and signs. He was physically good looking, of delicate facial skin, he was tall, thin, broad wide and muscled shoulders, with large beautiful seductive and magnetic eyes. His character was obstinate, firm, he did not change his opinion and he showed himself to be indifferent to contrary opinions, as he did not let himself be influenced by anyone. He was critical with quick psychology to find the defects and errors in others for which his advice from master to masters of Yoga was profound and direct. He was an idealist, with a heart harmonized with reason. He was always ready to sacrifice everything for his family, friends. He valued with preference action to words of false negotiations. He was both loathed and loved. He had a plan that he followed with firmness without ever deviating. There was never a “tomorrow” because for him only the present existed. His mind was absolutely free.

He managed his life with precision. He was the king to a beautiful and mystic kingdom called Dwaraka, which today partly under the sea & some parts in the present state of Gujarat. Dwaraka means “The door of Freedom” in Sanskrit. Krishna lived in Dwaraka close to 100 years. He was the great leader of his subjects who acclaimed and followed him with absolute royalty, given that he was an attentive governor to the needs of his subjects. His family life was especially unrepeatable. He was loved and he loved beyond all conventionalisms. His mother adored him and her example of love was converted into a guide of devotional love for the Vedic tradition. His sense of freedom was also reflected in his life. Krishna is a name full of mystic and philosophical content. Krishna means “black”, a symbol of Eternal Plenitude. Etymologically Krish + Na means “what is taken to the earth, to happiness”. Krishna is the “Most Attractive”, he who seduces everyone to keep them away from Adharma. Krishna is called the divine flutist that plays the flute of the 7 chakras on the Yoga body of the yogis granting them Moksha of Liberation.

Krishna was a Maha Avatara, a Great Divine Complement. An Avatar penetrates energy in the world to reincarnate taking on a body that not always has to have a human appearance or conceivable to the mind and perceptible to the senses. His material body is a vehicle for the divine manifestation (reincarnation). The advent of the Avatar is the complement through the material energy taking on a body of a special nature that allows the expression of the Maha Maya Shakti, the immense power that interacts in all material plains. The ancestral books of the Puranas tell that Shri Krishna lived 125 years, leaving his body in the year 3.102 B.C during the new moon of the month of Phalguna and when the darkness disappeared in the world of man and the era of Kali opened. In Kali Yuga, mans memory is weak, life short and the confusion of Dharma creates a disjointed society, the loss of historical memory, the loss of spiritual references and the beginning of barbarianism. The great teaching of Krishna and his great power is concentrated in the Bhagavad Gita. The Gita, the All-powerful Song, contains the instructions given to his disciple Arjuna in the middle of the battlefield of Kurukshetra, where Yoga, Vedanta and the essence of the Vedas were synthesized. The Gita is actually the path which Vedic Dharma flows through. The Sadhana of the Advent has as its objective to give happiness to the Sadhaka, eliminate the sadness caused by pain in life, give potential to the capacity to do Karma Yoga, the integral Yoga of Karma, Bhakti and Gñyana Yoga united in Raja Yoga: correct action, Supreme Devotion, and Perfect Wisdom in the Sovereignty of the Mind.

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

Remaining Unperturbed- 03

Once a guy visited my Guru and said that he was very worried about his addiction to coffee. My Guru told him, “it seems you have divided yourself into 2 parts, one of which is addicted to coffee and the other is addicted to worrying. Otherwise how is it possible that you drink mugs & mugs of coffee and worry together? Either one is possible but not both. Since you do both together, it is obvious there are two ‘You’, two selves in you. One of whom goes on having gallons of coffee and the another who keeps repenting it, condemning it and cursing it. And the problem is, the one that has coffee will continue till the end of life and the other part of you will go on repenting all along the line. The repenting self will go on taking vows and pledges again and again to quit coffee.” So my Guru said to him, “You should do only one thing- either have coffee without repenting or quit coffee. If you try both, you will always be in hell. If you have coffee, be totally involved in having coffee without sparing an iota of your being. Don’t allow even a fragment of your being to stand aloof like a judge condemning coffee or justifying it.”

And then my Guru said, “If you can become integrated and whole in drinking coffee, then a day will come when the whole being in you can quit coffee, and quit it effortlessly and completely. The one who is addicted to coffee totally can quit the coffee as totally. He will never live perpetually in conflict of to be or not to be. And he will enjoy coffee and not having coffee.” A fragmented person is neither here nor there. He is miserable when he is having coffee because his other part condemns him as a sinner. And when he quits coffee, the addict in him asserts, saying that he is missing a great pleasure and luxury. There is no need for this conflict, misery and restlessness. Ne among us who is complete, who is total, who becomes one with any and every situation comes his way, such a person ceases to be witness. That person transcends witnessing. Witnessing is a means not an end. Krishna is not a witness although he exhorts Arjuna to be a witness. In Krishna there is no alienation between the subject and object, between the observer and the observed. Now there is only observing, a process of observation. And this is total.

Let us contemplate in this line of thinking and meet next week with more observation!

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

Sthitaprajna – Remaining Unperturbed- 02

Krishna is not asking us to kill our sensitivity. On the contrarily, he wants us to heighten our sensitivity to its utmost, so it becomes total. Krishna stands for sensitivity, and total sensitivity at that.  Let us understand it in another way. What is meant by total sensitivity? This needs to be understood in depth. We divide everything in our life, and this is not the right thing to do. Life is really indivisible. When we say to someone “I love you,” the statement is linguistically correct, but existentially it is all wrong. When we are in love with someone we really become the love itself in respect to that person. Then we are wholly love, that means no part of our being remains outside of love. Even if there is a fragment in us that knows or says I am in love, it means we are not totally in love. And if we are partially in love we are not in love at all. 

Love cannot be fragmentary, partial at all. Either we love or we don’t. Fragmented is incomplete. Since we fragment everything, it is our problem and is our misery. When someone says he is happy, know well that his happiness is not complete. Happiness might have visited him with or without his knowledge and he might have been really happy in that split second. But the moment he comes to know he is happy, is the moment when his happiness has left him. Who is the one who knows he is happy? It is certainly the unhappy part of his being which knows and recognizes happiness. If a person is integrated and total in himself, then there will be no one to know or say that he is happy or unhappy. Then he will not be happy, he will be happiness itself. Then and only then his sensitivity will be at its highest, at its peak. 

In such a state of total sensitivity, every fiber of my being, my total being will be happy or unhappy, loving or hating, quiet or restless. Then there will be no one disturbed about it, or even to know it. If I am totally in happiness or unhappiness, if I am happiness or unhappiness itself, then I don’t evaluate it or compare it. I don’t identify myself with it or condemn it. I don’t cling to it or resist it. Then I don’t even name it. When sensitivity is total, the question of being agitated or disturbed does not arise. Let us contemplate on this … 

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

Sthitaprajna

Remaining unperturbed- 01

Krishna says Sthitaprajna is one who remains unperturbed and steady in the midst of both happiness and misery. And it makes us to think that if someone does not feel happy in happiness and miserable in misery; will it not destroy his sensitivity? There are two ways of remaining unperturbed in the midst of happiness and suffering. One way is to kill our sensitivity. Then we will cease to be either happy or miserable. If our tongue is burned we will cease to taste both the sweet and bitter. If our eyes are blinded we will neither know light nor the darkness. Insensitivity is the simplest way of achieving evenness of mind in both pleasure and pain. And it is not surprising that by and large Krishna’s followers have chosen the way of insensitivity. Most of those who are known as Sannyasin, renunciate or recluses do nothing but systematically destroy their sensitivity so they become dead to the experience of pleasure and pain, happiness and misery. But this is a travesty of what Krishna really means. 

Krishna’s meaning is very different. He says a Sthitaprajna remains unperturbed in pleasure and pain- he does not say he is insensitive to them. He means to say that a wise man goes beyond happiness and sorrow; he transcends them- not by killing his sensitivity but by attaining to a higher state of consciousness, to super consciousness. An unconscious person, one under the influence of drugs, is insensitive to pain and pleasure but he cannot be said to have transcended to them. He has rather fallen below the normal state of consciousness. In that way every dead person is insensitive. Transcendence is entirely different, profound and meaningful. 

In my view Krishna’s way of transcending happiness & sorrow is different and unique. If we experiences happiness fully, if we are utterly sensitive to pleasure, if we live it so totally that no other thing remains to be lived, we will soon transcend it. Then we will be unperturbed and steady in every situation of pleasure and happiness. Similarly if we experience pain and misery totally, if we go into it with all our being, without trying to escape it in the least, we will go beyond the misery too. We will never again be disturbed by suffering. Krishna is not asking us to kill our sensitivity. On the contrarily, he wants us to heighten our sensitivity to its utmost, so it becomes total. Krishna stands for sensitivity, and total sensitivity at that.  

Let us think, contemplate and analyze this point. More to come next week!

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

Krishna on Bondage 14

Krishna’s non attachment is absolute surrender of ego, total cessation of the “I”. 

It is just to know that I am not, only God is. And once I know that what is, there no way but to accept it in its totality. Then there is nothing to be done or undone, altered or modified. Krishna sees himself as a wave in the ocean. He has no choice, what so ever. Then the question of aversion or attachment does not arise. If we understand it correctly, Krishna’s anasakti is not a state of mind. It is really a cessation of all states of mind, of mind itself. It is to be one with the whole. Through this royal road of unity with the whole, Krishna arrives exactly where Mahavira, Buddha and Jesus arrive through their paths. 

Travelerson footpath can walk quietly, but one cannot escape the noise and tumult of the multitude if he chooses a highway for the journey. We will have to face the high winds restlessness and uneasiness, which will in long run usher us into peace and quietness. Those who choose to move off the beaten paths can have the joy of being alone and individual, but those on the highways have to share in the pleasures and pains of all others. There is this much difference between the two. 

Krishna is a multi- dimensional, a multi- splendored person, and the highway is his choice. The truth is no one path, and no ready-made path to God. There are as many paths as there are as many people in the world. No two persons are alike, or in the same state of being. So, each one of us will have to begin our journey just where we are and find our way to God all alone. Of course, all roads lead to the same destination, which is one and only one. Whether we follow the path of neutrality or indifference or transcendence or bliss, the goal remains the same. 

While paths and roads are many, the goal is the same. Instead of debating endlessly on what is right path or wrong path, which is a waste of time and energy, we should carefully choose the path that accord with our individuality, our self-nature. 

Here ends the topic on ‘Krishna on Bondage’. Namastey

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

Krishna on Bondage 13

Many among us believe that there are two forces in this world: one is the force of good or God and the other is the force of evil or Devil. We think if there is evil in this world then it has to be segregated from God, who represents goodness and goodness alone. So we have to find a separate place for devil, and we assigned an independent role to him. Krishna strongly contends this assumption. He asks: if there is evil and it is separate, is it so with the consent of God or without? Does evil, in order to be, need the support of God or not? If there is independent authority call devil, it means a parallel to the authority of God. Then there are two independent sovereign authorities in the universe. Then there is no question of good or ever winning over evil or evil being defeated by good. 

Krishna rejects this concept outright. He says there is only one sovereign force, one primal energy in the universe, and everything is arises from this single primeval source. It is the same energy that brings forth a healthy fruit and the diseased fruit on the branches of a tree. It is not necessary have a separate source of energy or power for the two. It is the same mind which gives rise to both good and evil, virtue and vice. Both good and evil are different transformation of one and the same energy. Day and light, light and dark are emanations of the same force. Therefore Krishna is against denial, renunciation of any of the dualities. He is all for the acceptance, total acceptance of both, Life, as it is, has to accepted and lived choice-less way and totally. That is what Krishna’s anasakti or non attachment means. 

Krishna’s anasakti does not mean choice of one against the other. It does not mean that we choose to be attached to virtue against vice, or to be attached to vice against virtue. It is neither attachment nor aversion. He stands for surrender to life as it is, and this surrender has to be total. Anasakti means that I am not at all separate. I am one with the whole existence. That is why Krishna is at peace, because he has nothing more to achieve. He is at limitless bliss. For him universe is God, Godly: there is nothing other than God. That is where he is calling us to. 

Krishna’s non attachment is absolute surrender of ego, total cessation of the “I” 

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

Krishna on Bondage 12

Last few weeks I was writing a lot about Buddha, Mahavira & Jesus in the topic Krishna on bondage. It was not out of context. To understand a concept or philosophy, there is a need for comparative study. Now I am getting back to Krishna to go for a crescendo finish. Krishna’s anasakti. Non-attachment, in its turn has some similarity with Mahavira’s transcendence, Buddha’s indifference and Jesus’s neutrality. But it has some basic differences too. I would not be wrong if I say that Krishna’s anasakti is transcendence, indifference and neutrality rolled into one, plus something more. 

Krishna’s non attachment is different from Buddha’s upeksha or indifference. Krishna says indifference is a kind of attachment. If I meet you in the passing and if I don’t look at you, it will be indifference on my part. But if looking at you is attachment then not looking is equally attachment- attachment in reverse gear. And furthermore, Krishna asks, “How can anyone be indifferent? Indifferent to what? If the whole world is manifestation of God, then one is indifferent to God himself.”  And the Krishna asks another question: “How can anyone who is indifferent be free of ego? To be attached or to be indifferent one needs ego. If I am attached to God and indifferent to the world, it is my ego operating in both cases.” So Krishna does not use a condemnatory term like indifference. 

Krishna does not accept the concept of transcendence of attachment or aversion. He says if attachment and aversion are wrong then there is no reason for them to exist, but they do exist. 

Similarly Krishna is against neutrality. How can be neutral about anything when god is not neutral? He is utterly involved in everything that there is. Neutrality in life is unnatural and impossible, as per Krishna. We are in the midst of life. We are life. It is life and nothing but life all over. Then how can we keep ourselves aloof from life? The Sanskrit word for neutrality is tatasthata, which means to leave the mainstream and stand on the bank. But so far as life is concerned, it is main stream all over without any banks. And how can we stand on the non-existent bank of life? So Krishna says it is impossible to be neutral or indifferent in life. 

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people 

Krishna on Bondage -11

We all have looked at statue of Buddha. Silence surrounds it, peace permeates it, and serenity emanates from it. Nothing can disturb his peace and silence. Even a pond is disturbed by passing breeze, by the rays of sun which turn it into vapour and takes it to sea as rain. Buddha is so still that he has no desire whatsoever to move to ocean of eternity. He says the ocean will have to come to him if it wants. For this reason Buddha refuses to answer questions about transcendental. Is there God? What is liberation? What happens after death? Questions like these are always shunned by Buddha. He gently laughs them by saying, “Don’t ask such questions that have to do with distant future. They will distract from immediate present, which is of the highest. The thought of distant future will give rise to desire to travel to it, and to reach it. And this desire will give restlessness. I am utterly contended with what I am, where I am. I have nowhere to go and I have nothing to choose and find. ” So Buddha is not indifferent to this world, he is also indifferent to the other world of God & nirvana.

Buddha says, “Even to find God you will have to pass through the swamp of hopes and fears, attachment and jealousies. Whatever I am, I am. I am utterly contented, I am at perfect peace.” So his indifference has no objective, no goal whatsoever to achieve. Look at Buddha’s face, his eyes and there is not a trace of agitation in them. They are as silent as silence itself. It is like a still lake where there is not even a ripple rises. Naturally Buddha’s peace is different. It can have neither Krishna’s outspoken bliss nor Mahavira’s subtle joy. It is true that a man of tremendous silence, who has no desires whatsoever- not even desire to find the ultimate- will attain to bliss without asking. But this bliss will be his inner treasure; this lamp of bliss will shine in his interiority, while his whole external milieu will be one of utter peace and silence. His halo will reflect only harmony, stillness and order. Bliss will form his base and peace will make his summit. 

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

Krishna on Bondage 10

These few weeks let us analyze the life of great souls & try to understand their different approaches towards life. There is a good deal of similarity between Christ’s concept of neutrality, Buddha’s idea of indifference, Mahavira’s transcendence of attachment and Krishna’s non-attachment. These are the ways of looking at and meeting the world. But there are some basic differences too. While their end-points are similar, their approaches are very different. While their ultimate goal is same, they differ much in the ways and means they use to achieve their ends. 

There is deep similarity between what Christ calls neutrality or non-alignment with the world at large, and what Buddha calls indifference to it. As the world is with all its strange goings-on, its contradictions and conflicts, its struggles and trials, a seeker on the spiritual path will do well to keep a distance from it. But we must remember, neutrality can never be blissful. Deep down it makes us sad. If I don’t choose life, if I reject it completely, if I say I take neither this nor that, and then I will soon stop flowing, I will stagnate. If a river refuses to move in any direction, it will cease to flow, it will stagnate. It will turn into a closed pool. It is true that stagnant pool of water too will reach the ocean, but not in the way river reaches it. It will first vaporize under sun and then into clouds and then descend on the ocean in the form of rains. It will not have the joys of river, pushing its way to ocean, singing, dancing, and celebrating.  

Buddha’s indifference is silent, peaceful and quiet. Buddha is never sad; he is just quiet, serene and silent. If he lacks the dance of Krishna, and secret bliss of Mahavira, he is also free of sadness of Jesus- sadness for the suffering of masses. Buddha is utterly settled in his peace, his silence. Buddha has attained to indifference, which is different from neutrality. He has come to know that everything in life, as we know it, is meaningless, so nothing now is going to disturb his peace. Every alternative, every choice in life is same for him. So his stillness, his calm, his peace is total. Buddha has attained to absolute choicelessness.  For him nothing is good or bad, right or wrong, black or white. For him summer and winter, day and night, pleasure and pain, laughter and tear are the same. For him choicelessness is the choice!

More analysis will follow coming week!

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

Krishna on Bondage 9

I have heard that a rebel sage (A sage is always a rebel) was thrown into prison for his irrepressible love of freedom. He was going around the country singing songs of freedom. He was a Sufi sage and his captor was a Caliph who was both the religious and temporal head of Mohemmedanism. The sage was put in shackles from his neck downward, but he continued to sing his songs of freedom. One day the Caliph came to see him and inquired if he had any troubles. The sage asked, “What troubles? I am a royal guest, your guest; what troubles can I have? I am utterly happy. I live in a hut and you have put me in a palace. Thank you! ”

The Caliph was amazed. He asked, “Are you joking?” The Sufi said, “I say so because I have turned life itself into a joke.” Then the Caliph came with a down to earth question: “Are the chains on your hands and legs heavy and painful?” The Sufi looked at his chains and said, “These chains are far away from me. There is a great distance between me and these chains. You may be under the illusion that you have imprisoned me, but you can only imprison my body, you cannot imprison my freedom. You cannot turn freedom into prison because I know how to turn prison into freedom.”

It all depends on us, on how we see things. Seeing is foundational. We have to understand what the Sufi told the Caliph, “These chains are far away from me. There is a great distance between me and these chains.” Our life becomes what we are psychologically and spiritually, our death becomes what we are in our mind and spirit. If we are free, our birth our life, our death, everything becomes free. And similarly if we are in bondage, then everything we do or we don’t do binds us. Then action binds, love binds, life binds and even death binds. Then even God binds. 

In fact, we are our own makers. 

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

Krishna on Bondage 8

We human are the strange creation of all. We turn even our love to bondage. I receive wedding invitations from my friends, relatives and patient’s family. They invariably write in their wedding invitation letters that their daughter or son is going to be “bound with fetters of love.” We turn even love, which is utter freedom, into shackles. Love is freedom, so the right way to say it is that someone is going to be set free in love. But we say and do the opposite; we turn love into an imprisonment. Not that love is imprisonment, but we make it into one. The way we are, even death looks like captivity to us. The way we are, we turn life itself into a concentration camp. 

On the other hand, he who lives in the present, in the moment, who among us lives without expectations and attachments and does his work without hope for reward or fear of punishment, whose action is like inaction and whose inaction is like action, who turns his whole life into a play- he turns even bondage into freedom. For such a person among us, action is freedom, love is freedom, living is freedom, living is freedom, life is freedom, and even death is freedom. For him everything is freedom. 

It all depends on the way we are and we see the life. We carry both our slavery and freedom within us. If we begin to live without desire for the fruits of action, if we become responsible to ourselves and to the existence, if we trust life, then life for us will cease to be bondage. The life will be a blessing, a benediction. Such a person in us attains a life of freedom; he is free while living in this world. Such a life is possible here and now. And it totally depends on us!

Let us analyze more, later in the weeks to follow … until then let us spend some time contemplating on the same. 

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

Krishna on Bondage 7

Let each of our actions, no matter whether you are peeling a potato or composing a poem, let us be complete in it. Let us leave the result to god. If we do so, Krishna says, we will be released from bondage that comes in the form of birth. Krishna does not say that birth is bondage. He only says that one who is full of expectations, who is attached to the fruits of action is always in need of tomorrow, future, future life. Among us who live in desires, in hopes and expectations anxiously seeks a new birth after his death. That person cannot escape rebirth. And for such a person birth becomes bondage and it can never become the freedom. Because such a person is not really interested in life and living, he is interested in his expectations, in the results he expects from it. For him birth is just an opportunity for achieving some results. And for such a person death is going to be very painful, because death will put an end to all desires and demands he lived for. 

Naturally when he is born again he will find his birth to be his bondage. Birth is bondage for one who does not know the life that is freedom. In fact desiring is bondage, craving and attachment to result is bondage. To live and know life totally is freedom. And for one who knows this life there is no birth and death. He is released from both birth and death. Krishna has said only the half truth; it is a half truth to say that one is released from the fetters of birth. To complete it, we should understand he is released from death as well. We are released from both birth and death. 

This does not mean that birth and death are bondage. In ignorance, for an ignorant person birth and death appear to be bondage; they bind the ignorant. For a person of wisdom among us, one who knows the truth, birth and death cease to be, he is in freedom. In fact bondage and freedom are states of mind. While the ignorant mind experiences bondage, the mind of the wise is free. Krishna does not condemn birth as such, but the way we are, birth feels like imprisonment to us.    

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

Krishna on Bondage 6

There is a significant episode in the life of Mohammed. Mohammed is a rare kind of sannyasin. Everyday his followers bring all kinds of gifts for him. Someone brings sweets, another brings cloths, and another brings money. Mohammed shares everything with his visitors and others, and if something is leftover by evening he asks his wife to distribute it among the needy. By evening Mohammed again becomes a pauper, a fakir. When sometimes his wife suggests that something should be saved for tomorrow, he says, “Tomorrow will come as today, and it will care for itself. Worrying for tomorrow means I don’t trust existence, which has provided everything for today. I trust existence will provide for our tomorrow too.” Mohammed insists that his wife give away everything that is left over saying, “With trust in our hearts we will wait for tomorrow” I am a theist, and if I save for tomorrow God will say, “Mohammed, don’t you have even this much trust in me?” 

This is the way Mohammed lives all through his life. And when he was at death bed, his wife saves few coins for some future emergency. That night Mohammed asks his wife about it and she was surprised he knew about it. Mohammed answers his wife, “Looking at your face tonight I can see you are not calm and peaceful as you always are. For sure there is some money in the house. Those who are worried become acquisitive and acquisitive people become worried. It is a vicious circle, so take out what you have saved and distribute it so that I can die in peace.” His wife was worried if she could find someone at that mid night. Mohammed says his wife, “Just call out and someone will come.” And someone, a beggar really appears at the door. Mohammed says his wife, “Just see, if someone comes to take in the dead of night, someone else can come to give as well.” This was his last act and he died at peace. 

If each day, each moment, each act is complete, it will be followed by a complete tomorrow. Then the tomorrow will be new and fresh, not old and stale. The future will never confirm to our expectations, because the future is immense and our hopes and desires are petty, trivial. The immense, the infinite cannot be controlled and manipulated by the trivial. A drop cannot decide the course of river; the river goes its own way irrespective of what the drop wants. This is man’s misery: it is hopes and dreams of future that turn into frustration and despair. 

One who lives each moment totally knows no anxiety and no frustration. He is contented and blissful and fulfilled.

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

Krishna on Bondage 6

Krishna’s vision of action without attachment to results is clear. He tells us to be totally in the present, in the moment. He tells us not to divide ourselves between present and future. Not even a fraction of our attention should be passed on to the future. Then only we can act wholly and joyously, and then only will our action be total. Desire for results is a distraction from action, so we must try and give up our attachment to results and be totally in action. Leave future to future, to existence. Otherwise our habit of being fragmentary will pursue us through out. And this wholeness, not our desire, will bear fruit. So we can trustfully leave the matter of fruit in the hands of God or existence or whatsoever we like to call it. I would like to explain it in a different way. Unless we make action our joy, unless we love what we do, unless we do something for the love of it, we cannot be free of our attachment to the future, to result. And unless our action flows from our being, our blissfulness, like a stream flows from its source, we cannot be totally into it. We will always tend be pulled by the future.    

Do you think a stream is flowing towards some future? Do you think a river is running to the sea? You are mistaken if you think so. It is another matter that the river reaches the ocean- but is certainly not flowing for the sake of the ocean. A river flows for the love of flowing, and this energy, this force, this strength of a river comes from its source, its original source. Of course the river reaches the sea, but it is just a by product, it is inconsequential. 

Life is a play of energy- like a river it moves with its own energy. Krishna says man should live so that his action stems from his own energy, from its innermost source. The river Ganga dances not only when she reaches the shore of the ocean, she dances on every bank. She dances through hills and valleys, through green forests and dry deserts, through cities and villages, through happiness and misery, through human beings and animals. She dances and rejoices where ever she happens to be. And if she reaches the ocean it is just a consequence which she neither desired nor expected. It is the culmination of her life’s journey. It is existence’s echo, its answer to her. 

In my view there is only one difference between a house holder and a sannyasin: a house holder lives for tomorrow, he is future oriented. A sannyasin lives and flowers now and here. He derives his strength from his today. For his today, now is enough unto itself. And when a sannyasin’s tomorrow comes, it will come in the form of his today, and he will live it the way he lives his today. In the next week I wish to share a significant episode in the life of Mohammed. Mohammed is a rare kind of sannyasin. 

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people

Krishna on Bondage 5

Krishna’s vision of action without attachment to results is clear. He tells us to be totally in the present, in the moment. He tells us not to divide ourselves between present and future. Not even a fraction of our attention should be passed on to the future. Then only we can act wholly and joyously, and then only will our action be total. Desire for results is a distraction from action, so we must try and give up our attachment to results and be totally in action. Leave future to future, to existence. Otherwise our habit of being fragmentary will pursue us through out. And this wholeness, not our desire, will bear fruit. So we can trustfully leave the matter of fruit in the hands of God or existence or whatsoever we like to call it. I would like to explain it in a different way. Unless we make action our joy, unless we love what we do, unless we do something for the love of it, we cannot be free of our attachment to the future, to result. And unless our action flows from our being, our blissfulness, like a stream flows from its source, we cannot be totally into it. We will always tend be pulled by the future.    

Do you think a stream is flowing towards some future? Do you think a river is running to the sea? You are mistaken if you think so. It is another matter that the river reaches the ocean- but is certainly not flowing for the sake of the ocean. A river flows for the love of flowing, and this energy, this force, this strength of a river comes from its source, its original source. Of course the river reaches the sea, but it is just a by product, it is inconsequential. 

Life is a play of energy- like a river it moves with its own energy. Krishna says man should live so that his action stems from his own energy, from its innermost source. The river Ganga dances not only when she reaches the shore of the ocean, she dances on every bank. She dances through hills and valleys, through green forests and dry deserts, through cities and villages, through happiness and misery, through human beings and animals. She dances and rejoices where ever she happens to be. And if she reaches the ocean it is just a consequence which she neither desired nor expected. It is the culmination of her life’s journey. It is existence’s echo, its answer to her. 

In my view there is only one difference between a house holder and a sannyasin: a house holder lives for tomorrow, he is future oriented. A sannyasin lives and flowers now and here. He derives his strength from his today. For his today, now is enough unto itself. And when a sannyasin’s tomorrow comes, it will come in the form of his today, and he will live it the way he lives his today. In the next week I wish to share a significant episode in the life of Mohammed. Mohammed is a rare kind of sannyasin. 

Wishing you good health & happiness,

Dr. Dwarakanath, Director, Mitran foundation- the stress management people