Bhagavadgeeta : ( 26/11/2012. )

Chapter 13: Centring the Mind in the Heart-18. Desires cease when their root is pulled out. The root is the affirmation of the ego. The ego cannot absolve itself from attachment to its own being unless it dedicates itself to God. The ego will never turn to God, because it is also an affirmation—an affirmation contrary to the All-being of God. While God is All-being, ego is individual being; that is their difference, so one does not go with the other. The dedication of the ego to God-being becomes difficult, because the ego does not accept the fact that its desires can be fulfilled by an abolition of itself. The greatest sorrow of the ego is its feeling that its existence is going to be affected by the devotions of religion. People are afraid to turn towards God because of the feeling that they will lose things of this world. Religious devotees sometimes have a subtle suspicion at the back of their minds that the gain of God may imply a loss of things of this worl...

Chapter 13: Centring the Mind in the Heart-17. But no desire can be fulfilled in this manner. The ego is futilely attempting to fulfil its desires by grabbing things in this world. The more it desires, the more are the multitudes of desires that crop up, like the raktabeeja we hear of in the story of Devi Mahatmaya. The more we shed the blood of that rakshas, the more he multiplies himself into a large army which takes up weapons in the field of battle. This raktabeeja in the Devi Mahatmaya is nothing but desire itself. Desire cannot be rooted out completely; its fulfilment is not its destruction. On the other hand, any kind of pampering of a desire by merely satisfying it in an externalised form intensifies it. The samskaras or the impression that is created in the mind at the time of the so-called satisfaction or fulfilment of a desire forms a groove in the mind, and that groove becomes a source for further impulse from within to repeat this experience, and desire...

Chapter 13: Centring the Mind in the Heart-16. After attaining God, there is no rebirth. Mam upetya punar janma duhkhalayam asasvatam, napnuvanti mahatmanah samsiddhim paramam gata h-: Reaching all the planes of existence lower to God, there can be a reversion of the soul to those conditions where its unfulfilled desires can manifest themselves for fulfillment. When God is the sole object of desire, when desires fulfil themselves entirely at one stroke, there remains no other desire to pull the soul back to the earth or any lower plane of existence. Punar janma, rebirth, as I mentioned earlier, is not necessarily a rebirth in this world. It is a rebirth in any condition of being, any plane of existence anywhere in creation, any part of the cosmos—which are supposed to be infinite in number. Any state which is less than the realisation of God is a rebirth; it may be in any lower plane. But the whole process of reincarnation is rent asunder, cut at the root when the ...

Chapter 13: Centring the Mind in the Heart-15. Ananya-cetah satatam : - Tremendous conditions are laid, though it is said that the whole attainment is very easy. It appears, if we try to understand the meaning of this sloka, that the Teacher, the Master of the Gita is telling us that He is easy of approach, provided that something is done. This provision is a very difficult one again; the whole mind has to be united—we have to be ananya-cetah. This ananya-cetah or the unitedness of our thoughts or feelings, the mind and the reason with the Supreme Being should be continuous and not be with remission of effort. Satatam :- The whole day and night we should be thinking of That only. Ananya-cetah satatam yo mm smarati nityasah : - Daily we should resort to this practice—continuity, daily practice in the unitedness of all our being with God. Tasyaham sulabhah : - To such a person I am easy. Nitya-yuktasya yoginah : - To the yogi who is united with me perpetual...

Chapter 13: Centring the Mind in the Heart-14. This one thought is the most difficult thing for many of us, because we have never known what this one thought could be. The difficulty arises because the soul does not ask for God. The reason may be asking, in its logical manner, but the soul is beclouded by the dark longings of the senses which, when they are not fulfilled, remain like a cloud covering the light of the Atman. We cannot concentrate on one thing, because we do not want that thing, really speaking. Our asking for God is not an asking by the mouth—a prayer that is uttered by the chanting of a song, or a linguistic prayer. It is a surging of our feelings and an impossibility to exist without God. Great saints and sages have passed through this crucial hour and difficult moment when they began to feel that even death is better than the loss of God’s consciousness, because the soul writhes and wriggles to catch That, without which it cannot even breathe. For...

Chapter 13: Centring the Mind in the Heart-13. When we chant Om we must also feel what we are chanting, and not merely feel, but also understand what it is. The whole being is there; that is called yoga—the union of the totality of being with the wholeness of the object. Such a person who departs from this world by the practice of yoga in this manner reaches the supreme state. He is not reborn; he does not come back to this world of mortality—yah prayati tyajan deham sa yati paramm gatim. All this may look very terrific, almost impractical for people living in this humdrum world of activity and business. “Is this yoga meant for me?” The great Teacher says : - “Do not be afraid; I am very easy of approach. I am not a difficult person, as you may imagine Me.” Ananya-cetah satatam yo mam smarati nityasah, tasyaham sulabhah partha nitya-yuktasya yoginah. “I am easy of attainment by those who are united with Me, who want Me and want nothing else.” The great quali...

Chapter 13: Centring the Mind in the Heart-12. The vibration can be conceived as identical with the Absolute in its original causative aspect. It can be also conceived as the seed of the cosmos. Therefore it is called saguna and nirguna both. It is absolute Brahman because it is all-comprehensive; there is nothing outside it, just as the continuum of energy, the force that is the source of this world, cannot be regarded as having anything outside it or external to it. Brahman is that, outside of which, nothing is. That which comprehends all, which includes everything, into which everything is absorbed, wherein anything can be found, any form, at any time and under any circumstance—that completeness is called Brahman, and Om is the symbol which represents the supreme Absolute. This yoga is therefore combined with the chanting of Om in this prescribed manner: Om ity ekaksaram brahma-vyaharan mam anusmaran. It is not merely a chant or a recitation in a verbal form ...

Chapter 13: Centring the Mind in the Heart-11. Om is more a vibration than a sound. There is a difference between sound and vibration, just as energy is not the same as sound, because while energy can manifest itself as sound, it can also manifest itself as something else, such as colour, taste, smell, etc. Just as electric energy can manifest itself as locomotion, as heat, as light, etc., the various configurations in the form of bodies or things in this world are expressions locally of this universal vibration which is the cosmic impulse to create, the creativity or the will of God that is identified with a cosmic energy. Om is the symbol of this comic force. Nada, bindu and kala are the terms used in some of the systems of thought to designate the various stages of development of this energy into grosser and grosser forms. From a single point it expands itself into the dimension of this universe in space and time, and from being merely an impersonal, unthinkable, supe...