From Ignorance to Bliss🔗

From stupidity to wisdom; from human nature to divinity; that is what, Patanjali, one of the greatest scientist sages of ancient India describes in his Yoga Sutras, as an eight fold path to achieve Yoga, union of the Self and the Divine.

We shall now look at one part of the first of the eight fold paths. The first part of the eight parts is called Yama. Yama refers to set of moral injunctions to be followed by any serious spiritual aspirant.

The first part of this eight part system, Yama consists of five elements: Ahimsa (non violence), Brahmacharya (living without fantasy), Satya (truth), Asteya (not stealing), and Aparigraha (living with what one has). Now we shall talk about just Satya, Truth.

Satya is just not truth of the words we utter. That's only one dimension. Thinking the truth and living the truth are the other two dimensions. Vedanta says you create what you want, you are the creator of the whole world; it's you who creates suffering and bliss. If we may ask: if we are the creator of the world why would we create suffering? The reason is that either consciously or unconsciously we are not being true to our Being; we are not living, acting, or speaking the truth.

When some one speaks we do not really listen to him, we do not believe him; we are constantly evaluating him, judging him; and we do not allow the words penetrate us, because we ourselves do not speak the truth. When it's against our vested interests, against our judgment we stop listening or ask him to stop if he can. In most cases we have already formed a judgment about that person, and we keep collecting arguments to support our preformed judgment.

If we are creators of our own world why do we create suffering? Continuously we create self contradicting desires. At a deep level, whether we accept it or not, believe it or not, understand it or not, we are God. Therefore we create trouble when we contradict our selves and give power to self contradicting thoughts. When we keep thinking of wanting to get rid of a disease, keep saying that I must not have this headache, or stomach ache or cancer, we are already meditating upon that disease; we give power to the word disease through thoughts, through utterance, we implant this word disease in our Being, and the disease will stay on. We can never get rid of an ache or pain by constantly wishing it to go away. Instead if we say let me be healthy, and if we bring the concept of health to our mind and Being, the ache and pain will disappear. Self contradicting thoughts such as trying to get rid of pain by thinking of pain are called samskaras and these get power and become real.

A person who speaks truth verbally or speaks only of facts is not established in satya. A person can talk facts and still be a liar.

In Mahabharata Krishna wants Drona to be destroyed. Drona is very attached to his son Aswattama. If he hears that Aswattama has died Krishna knows that Drona will give up fighting. Krishna tells Yudhishtra, the incarnation of Dharma, to say that Aswattama has died. Yudhishtra first refuses. Krishna makes Bhima kill an elephant called Aswattama and make Yudhishtra say that Aswattama has died. They say that till then Yudhishtra's chariot

Being truthful is something more than being factual. First you need to straighten your inner chatter. When an enlightened Master speaks it comes true, because they live in truth. They do not have self contradicting samskaras. These samskaras suck your energy and make you powerless. The word you repeat within yourself should be true. You give power to disease by just saying disease; being factual does not reduce suffering.

A man wants special powers. He goes to a Master and asks for a technique. When an enlightened Master gets special powers it benefits humanity and universe; but ordinary people getting such powers just cause trouble for themselves and others. The master tries to dissuade him. He does not listen. He says if you can not give tell me, I shall go elsewhere.

Ramana says: who says my devotees are followers. At first they follow. Then they do not listen. They want. They lead. Guru is there to do your homework; if he does not, you will leave him.

Francis of Assisi says: God is great because he answers our prayers. He is much greater because most of the time he does not answer many of our prayers.

We know only 120 degrees. Divine knows 360 degrees. God not only has Shakti to give but also the Buddhi to know when to give, or not to give. He makes us stronger by not giving us what we need.

Guru finally relents out of compassion for the stupid disciple. He gives this disciple a medicine and tells him, drink this and it will give you great powers; but do not remember a monkey when you drink the medicine; then it'll not have any effect. The disciple says that's fine, but what if I do think of a monkey. Master says you must bathe and try again. Every time he tries only moneys come to his mind. While bathing all he could remember were monkeys. He was running in and out of the bathroom. He was in the grip of a self contradicting desire; like thinking of a disease when trying to get rid of a disease.

He ran back to his master and cried: get rid of these monkeys. You can keep this medicine. I do not want any powers. I just want you to free me of these monkeys.

Try and spend half an hour a day to straighten your thinking, the same way as you spend in straightening your body and dress. Spend time in straightening out your samskaras, in clearing your thinking.

Satya is what gives peace and bliss to all. You can not speak arrogantly; arrogance creates anger, disturbance, and violence. If you say people are disturbed when you speak the truth, the truth that you express is your ego and arrogance, but not the

truth. You can always express truth politely, acceptably without hurting some one; only then it is truth. Pure truth can never be violent, can never hurt some one. At best it will be like a Doctor using a knife to clear some one of a problem, and not like a killer using a knife to harm some one.

Living Satya, living Truth in your life, through your body is essential. Einstein was on his death bed. All his disciples were around him. One asked what would you like to be when reborn, since he knew that Einstein believed in reincarnation. Einstein said: I would like to be born a plumber. They were shocked as they expected him to say many other great things. They asked why. He said: all my life I wanted to be a plumber. Environment made a scientist and I could not stop running the rat race. Whatever society gave me, money, status, and fame, all this is a big failure. I did not live my life. My life became a lie.

When the spirit takes birth again and again, it does that based on your desires. If all your

life and till the point of your death you focused on eating, you will take the body of a pig; If only in sleeping, the body becomes that of a buffalo. Based on these you choose what you will be, who your parents will be, what your life will be in the next birth. However, if you have lived a fulfilled life, you will have no desires left when the spirit leaves the body. It’s free to choose, whether to return or not; and if it does return it knows where to go.

If you believe that you have lived your life even if you live on a pavement homeless, you have lived your life. Otherwise your life has been a lie. Gita says: You will be in your next life what your last thought in this life is. If you feel fulfilled at the end of your life now, you will be liberated. When your spirit is unfulfilled, your death will be miserable and you will return again and again to run the rat race. The problem with the rat race is that even if you win you are still a rat.

A person asks: I wanted to be a cricketer, but my father made me do otherwise. I said: People who do what they really want always excel in what they do though they may not be materially successful. It’s too late for you. At least allow your children to do what they wish to. If you are already too old to fix the problem, do not impose the same suffering on others. Even the idea that you wanted to be a cricketer, be sure that it’s your own idea, not imposed on you by media and friends.

A person asks: They say, not even a blade of grass moves without God’s will. It’s also said everything is on free will. There is a dichotomy.

I said: The first statement is from an enlightened person and is true for him not for you. The second statement of free will is true for you. For an enlightened person, he moves in tune with the Universe. If you start saying that every thing depends on God, you will stop working; that is of no use. However, if you believe that statement fully and make your own effort, without bothering about the results, you will move towards enlightenment.

Patanjali therefore says live your life truthfully.

Mahavira Jaina says that when you are born, whatever you want to fulfill in this life upon Earth, your own desires that you wish to fulfill in this birth, you bring with you when you are born. God is so compassionate that he always sends everything you want when he sends you here. Why do we suffer then, why do we feel we are running short of everything. Because after we come down we do not live only our desires, we accumulate every one else's desires. We gather desires. When a neighbor buys an air conditioner the temperature in our house goes up. When we try to live other peoples' desires our live becomes a lie.

How to find out if our desires are truly ours? Till the age of 3 all our desires are genuine. From then on we start picking up other people’s desires, as we see them, as we interact with them, as we imitate them. We are mixed up. We are what society wants us to be. We are reacting. Even before we smile we ensure of the other person smiles. We express only when we feel we will be accepted. Meditation is the only way to infuse energy into your desires; infuse consciousness into your desires. What ever your own real desires are will stay; what are not will fall. Those that stay will have the energy to fulfill themselves. There will be no self contradiction. Your true desires will come true. When this happens you feel fulfilled.

Be in Satya, be in Truth: straighten your thoughts so that there is no self contradiction. Express in words without hurting others, with compassion. Live your life based on your own desires; do not accumulate other peoples’ desires.

Let God’s grace, let the cosmic energy fulfill us in body, mind and spirit to reach eternal bliss.

O fool! Cast off the desire for accumulation of wealth; create in the mind, thoughts about Reality, devoid of passion. What ever you get, what you have achieved through your past deeds, with that, satisfy your mind.

Bhaja Govindam 2