100. Give up for no reason🔗

Please understand, vairagya does not mean giving up all the wealth. It is neither about running behind the wealth, nor about giving up all the wealth. It is about living a liberated life.

How to live a liberated life - that is a big question! When I say this, people tell me, 'Swamiji, we understand that we have to work and make wealth and enjoy it, and we also understand that we must give up everything, renounce and live in poverty. We understand both. But what do you mean by a liberated life?'

Understand this one truth; it will bring real vairagya inside you.

Please understand, as long as we feel insecure, we go on accumulating, accumulating, accumulating. As long as we feel that matter can add value to us, we go on accumulating.

Suddenly, one day, we feel tired of the effort which we are putting into accumulation. Actually, most of the time people choose poverty not because they have started hating wealth, but because they have become tired of the effort to create and maintain wealth! It is unconscious laziness. They no longer want to take the responsibility of acquiring and maintaining wealth, and all the other responsibilities that come with it. So they suddenly decide, 'Let me renounce!'

Understand, just like the fear of insecurity makes you create more and more wealth, the fear of responsibility makes you renounce it, that's all!

Sri Ramakrishna tells a beautiful story. Sri Ramakrishna is a great enlightened master, the architect of modern-day Hinduisma, a very powerful master. He tells a story about an eagle that caught a fish. He was flying with that fish in his beak. Hundreds of crows started chasing him. Seeing this, the eagle felt that he could not fight all these crows, so he just threw away the fish. The crows stopped chasing him and started fighting for the fish instead, and the eagle relaxed. Understand: the eagle did not throw away the fish because he had stopped enjoying fish, or because he had suddenly become a vegetarian! No! He was not able to withstand the fight of the crows, and defend himself against the crows encroaching into his space, and take the responsibility of maintaining his position and his possessions - that is why he let it go.

The same thing happens in your life. You try to have the maximum security for your possessions - fire alarm, this alarm, that alarm, this insurance, that insurance. It goes on and on and on and on and on. And one day there is a flood, and when you go to claim the insurance, they show you the fine print which says that the insurance does not cover floods. Anyhow, when the responsibility of maintaining it all becomes too much, suddenly you decide to choose poverty. You choose poverty not because you don't enjoy wealth, or you don't want wealth, or you don't want the comforts and luxuries added to your life by wealth. You don't want the responsibilities, stress and tension added to your life by wealth! That is the truth.

When you renounce wealth, you go to the other extreme; you choose poverty. I have seen, sometimes people spend more money to be in poverty. The so-called vairagis or renunciants - I can say that almost all complications

and problems are created by them. They are free to have a cup of coffee or milk in any chai shop, that will be a lot more easy, but they have their own ideas, 'No, no, no, that is very costly milk or rich milk; I will have only simple cow's milk.' So naturally, a cow has to be taken everywhere with them in a separate vehicle! Nothing can be done about it! Many times, this misunderstood vairagya, this so-called simplicity, costs more to society than normal living. Just to maintain their poverty, society has to spend so much money on them.

Sometimes, people renounce even for the sake of name and fame. I have seen people giving donations in temples just for name and fame. Especially temples - they suffer with the smell of money, the smell of rich people. These people donate some board to in the temple with the deity's name printed on it. But the deity's name is only six inches wide and the donor's name is twelve inches wide, and finally you don't know whether the shrine is the deity's or the donor's! Or they donate a tubelight to the temple, and on the tubelight, in black paint, they would have written their name, their father's name, their grandfather's name, their grandmother's name, the names of all the people in whose memory they have donated the tubelight, and their son's and daughter's name will be there, and finally when the light is switched on. only the black shadow of the painted names will be seen on the wall!

Please understand, giving up for any reason is not vairagya. No! Please understand, giving up for any reason is araga or detachment. Only giving up for no reason is vairagya, the space that is beyond attachment or detachment.

CONTEMPLATION

Only giving up for no reason is vairagya, the space that is beyond attachment or detachment.