Work For 100 Years

Today I was unlucky , to waste a good Saturday morning with a bunch of folks desperate in life to earn  hell a lot of money. Money Money and More Money that was the topic of discussion in a group meeting conducted by a multi level marketing company. A kind of program where we invest some money and then refer two people to also invest. As the tree grows we get a lot of money. However he had a nice example to explain the same,  the olden civilization where formed in the river banks. People used to walk with vessels to get water, but some smart guy figured out the concept of brining the water to house using pipes or more primitively by digging a brook. Similarly we need to find a source of money and put a pipe for ourselves.
Again digging deeper into the daily routines of most of us, he concluded that we end up almost in a circle, work and home, work and home, work and home. In the mean while we don't dream or aspire for things and we end up as slaves.
Isn't  that what we are suppose to do ? Our holy scriptures also refer to the same. The second mantra of Ishopanishad is the perfect example.

"One should aspire to live a hundred years, only working..". What do they mean ? Do we work to eternity without tasting the fruits of our labour ? This is in some way reflects what Sri Krishna points to us in Geetha.
"Do your duty without worrying about the fruits of its labour". This makes me reflect on calligraphy craftsmen. They toil endlessly to make a particular painting. Japanese women perform every house hold activity as if its a ritual. I am sure a lot of us are aware of their tea drinking ceremony.

Working continously with undivided attention is a way to train our mind for concentration. This subsides the monkey within. A routine established helps us to prepare the inner soul for utlimate wisdom.... Hopefully that is what is explained in the upanishad. This is my interpretation, there will be definitely others....

The Synthesis of Yoga - 1

The nature essentially works out in presenting us complex things, which are in turn made out of a very simple elements in a fashion blind to our eyes. There is a cleary regularity in nature's all aspect if we know how to look into it. Complex things are continously broken apart into simpler matter as evolution continues. Nature and property of matter can be altered or changed either by combining them into complex things or dismantling them into simpler substances. A crude example can be a table, table is a complex material made out of wood and nails. Trees are cut, polished and weathered to get what is called as ply-wood, the nature of wood is different when its a tree and its completely different when it becomes ply wood .The same ply wood can be used to make cot or a almira or a table. Their utility varies with each version. This phenomenon is present in nature. Nature tries and tests everything as time passes by, with the ultimate aim of reaching perfection. This is what is termed as "Material Immortality" a very seemingly contradictory term coined by Sri Aurobindo. "To be constantly re-born is a condition of material immortality." Human beings are no expection to it.

Materials can obtain unimaginable capabilities by this continous action of synthesis and de-synthesis, which it would have appeared impossible looking at the face of it. This phenonmenon is termed as Yoga by our great ancient seers and saints. Yoga means continous evolution. Swami Vivekananda terms yoga as A Compressed Routine to attain evolution. Every form of yoga tries to do the same, evolution, mantling and dismantling or rather training in a unique way to attain those capabilities which seems impossible at the face of it. Hatha Yoga aims at training the various body parts, is it possible to bend ourselves backwards ? but a well trained hatha yoga expert can do the same. Raja Yoga is about training the mind to achieve greater level of activities, compared to the routine monotonous activity.

Nature has been doing the job of evolving its species in a continous manner, but Yoga would be a fast track to achieve the evolution in a quicker manner.

More to Come......

Meditating on Savitri

Have seen a couple of instances where mother mentions that one must try to meditate on Savitri. Since its a poem written in a different level of consciousness, we have to read it again and again without worrying too much about Literal understanding !!In the words of mother "Savitri alone is sufficient to make you climb to the highest peaks. If truly one knows how to meditate on Savitri, one will receive all the help one needs. For him who wishes to follow this path, it is a concrete help as though the Lord himself were taking you by the hand and leading you to the destined goal. And then, every question, however personal it may be, has its answer here, every difficulty finds its solution herein; indeed there is everything that is necessary for doing the Yoga."So what exactly is meditaion on a text ? I always use to wonder !!! I have spend a lot of time thinking of some of the books read or pondered over a piece of poetry or discussed in detail a movie watched.... but never understood the meaning of meditation on a text !!I am sure there should be a proper way of using Savitri in our day to day life !! The obvious one which is, as mother says read it daily irrespective of the literary meaning...

Song of the Spirit

Another day spent trying to read and digest the Introduction and the first Verse from Yogananda's God Talks with Arjuna. The intrdocution is very precise interms of explaining the essense of Gita. Bhagavad Gita means song of the Spirit. Its god's own words to the human soul. The whole of Gita dwells on the divine conversation explaining the divinity in every human and how to envoke it to reach back to the source, GOD.

The richness of a civilization is refelected in the arts and literature developed during that era. By that parameter, India has been far advanced in civilization long back dating to prehistoric times before the birth of christ. Gita in its 700 verses stands as an epitome of our literature, throwing various aspects on how advanced we were long ago.

The ego in each of us, separates us every day from the spirit. Yogananda rigtly terms it as body consciousness. We think of ourselves not as soul, rather as the human body and limit ourselves to the limitation of this body. Gita explains the science called Yoga, which is the only way to liberate ourselves from this thought.

Gita emphasises on sanyasa. What is sanyasa ? We would have seen different meaning for it, is it leaving all the material possession behind and retiring to Himalayas or some deep forest to perform Thapas ? No !!! Lord Krishna explains sanyasa as liberating oneself from the ego of body consciouness and uniting through the highest step of meditation, samadhi, with the Almighty.

Once we have GOD, do we need anything more ? He would be kind enough to materialize anything for us !!! Thus Gita in a nutshell points to us that we are all made in the reflection of GOD and our ultimate aim is to find him back and unite.

When we fail to deliver our duties

Chapter 2: Text 2

A daily inspiration verse, a right one to remeber when we are very low and we feel as if Krishna consoles us during those moments.

Lord Krishna seeing Arjuna depressed with the thought of fighting his kins, says the following words " From where has this illusions of yours appeared in this moment of krisis. This does not befit you in anyways. It will not lead you to the heavnly worlds but only to infamity."

When we try to refrain from our duties, and give a logic for the same, trying to pose ourselves as sacrificing things , its the lords voice which will ring on our ears to bring us back the spirit to fight, live and perform our duties in the best possible manner, with outmost devotion as if its a service to god, without worring about the success or the failure of the same.

Living a Thought

An idea or thought can be manifested only in the form of words inorder to justify it completely. The process of idea occurence and explanation are two entirely different phenomenon. When does an idea occurs to some one ? No Idea comes as a sudden thunderbolt, Newton's apple discovery story though alludes us to think that great ideas are sudden burst of impulse, its really not so. Newton would have been examining the peculiar aspect of earth in some form or other for a long long time, rather for the lack of right phrase, I would say, he lived that thought. The mind as believed by the great sages and saints of the east is a reservoir of super powers unknown to the vast majority of the man kind. The phenonmenon of "Living a thought" acts as a catalyst and throws open the facts from deep inner mind into the living being, that it looks very impulsive on the face of it.

JivanMukthi

Shishya : Reveared Guru, can you please explain me what is Mukthi ?

Guru: Getting away from the cycle of birth and death is Mukthi.

Shishya: I am born once and I die once, where is the question of escaping from it ? Please explain me !

Guru: When you confine your self to this body, it is very diffult to understand. You are not this body, you are the atman, the self, within you. As Sri Krishna said in Bhagavad Gita,

InAction and AVidhya

Sri Krishna in Bhagavad Gita Chapter 4, instructs the qualities of a self realized man, saying "One who can see action in inaction and inaction in action is the truly liberated soul".

Ishopanishad, in one of its mantra (Refer previous post) goes on to explore that "Those who worship avidhya enter darkness and those who verily worship vidhya enters deeper darkness."

Above statements should be pointing out to the same philosophy, for some reason the deeper physcological meaning is not coming out very clearly. May be its an experience which has to be experience by individuals and cannot be thought with the limited vocabulary available.

I remember that I had read somewhere that all these scriptures have been left obscure for individuals to explore themselves as they cannot be taught !!!!! (I think its Sri Aurobindo in his book "Synthesis of Yoga")

Gita - Chapter III

In Chapter III of Bhagavad Gita , the lord exposes to the twofold path of divine realization.
1. Sankya - Jyana Yoga - Realizing the supereme by the means of Knowledge
2. Karma Yoga - Divine appreciation in all our work.

It was Krishna who had manifested these paths at the start of the universe. Path of Sankya will not be possible for everyone. Very few have followed this path to attain self realization. Sri Aurobindo is one such great soul who had followed Jnaya yoga to understand the divinity within. Sri Krishna iterates the importance of Karma in this chapter.

All of us have been sent to this world with a divine purpose. We cannot escape this purpose calling ourself renounciates. We have to perform our duties in this earth with dedication. The primary thing to be understood in the context of our duties is that, its Krisha who is the doer, Krishna who is the object of doing and its Only Krishna alone who reaps the benefits of it. We have to be indifferent to the success or failure of our karma. Never rejoice nor repent.
Always perform every duty in our day today life to please Krishna.