Relevance of the Bhagavadgita to Humanity : 28-3. Swami Krishnananda.

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Chinmaya Mission

Under the guidance of Swami Sivayogananda, Bhagavad Gita Chanting Competition and Prize distribution function was organized by Chinmaya Mission, Madurai on 6th November at Sethupathi Higher Sec School, Madurai. The competition has been organized consecutively for the past 23 years.

Around 12000 children from 38 schools have participated at the preliminary level, out of which 500 such young stars were shortlisted for the finals. 

The Best ones were bestowed with Gold and Silver Coins and special certificates. Notebooks, Stationery Kits certificates were presented to all the participants by Sri.Nagaraj Krishnan, Managing Director, Aparajitha Corporate Services.

Smt.Jamuna, Rajapalayam lighted the lamp. Sri.K.S. Pradeep, DeputyGeneral Manager, Canara Bank Circle Office, was the Chief Guest for the function and inaugurated the competition. 

The event ended with Swami Sivayogananda explaining the vision behind the competition and the greatness of Bhagavad Gita Chapter 3, Karma Yoga and scrumptious Lunch!

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Monday, November 14, 2022. 08:30.

Chapter 28: Sitting for Meditation-3.

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Here is some interesting sideline, namely, the object of concentration should be attractive because how would the mind think an unattractive thing? A repelling object or something which one resents cannot be taken as an object of meditation. Now, a thing cannot be attractive unless a value is seen in it. When a value is recognised in a particular thing, it becomes attractive. But how would you see any value in any object? The meaning that it has for you in your practical life is the value: Does this have any meaning for me? In my present condition, does this mean anything? To the extent it means something to me, to that extent it may look beautiful and attractive also. But if in my present condition this is of no utility to me, then it is not attractive. I can see no value in it, nor will I be propelled to think of it too much. It means nothing to me.

But this is not the way you have to think when you are scientific, you may say, in your approach to things. Yoga is a science. It is not an emotional reaction to anything. It is not loving in an emotional sense, or in a sentimental manner. It is a love born of understanding. It is rational appreciation and not an emotional, sentimental or biological impulse in respect of any object outside because you cannot trust impulses which are emotional, volitional, biological, etc. They are untrustworthy propelling forces, which will not propel you always. They can subside because they are appetites which ask for some food, and when the food is supplied, the appetite will subside. Therefore, it cannot be always a dynamo that can supply you enough energy. That dynamo will stop, so there must be a perpetually reliable mechanism within you which can generate that perennial energy in you which will not subside. 

The object of my concentration is very beautiful. It is full of meaning to me. It is so because it is all value for me. All the value that I can expect anywhere in the world, I see in this object. All the world of meaning is concentrated for me in this object. Firstly, I may not see any meaning in anything in the world except in this object; or even if there is some meaning in other things in the world also, taking that for granted, accepting it, all the meaning that may be there in other things I see here also, so that there is no point in my thinking anything else. Whatever I can expect from anywhere else, I can have here also. Now, how will you convince yourself that this is the case? Is it humanly possible to accept that any particular thing that you are thinking of in your mind as your dear object of meditation and yoga is all things and all values and all meaning – all father and all mother, all treasure? Is it possible for your heart and feeling to accept this fact?

Consciously considering what we are in our superficial level of waking existence, this is not possible. We cannot love a thing like that. In our conscious life we are shells of personality, fragments, though basically we are a whole. If we take all the levels of our psyche as a total whole, then we can manifest a total love for this object, but if we employ only the surface of our life, which is conscious living, as a means of concentrating, then the lower levels of the psyche, which may be stronger in their demands, may prevent our taking excessive interest in this particular object. They will say, “We shall not allow this because we too have something to say.”

Therefore, it is necessary for us to be conscious of whatever demands may come from our own selves inside. Have you any demands other than this that you have chosen now? It is no use imagining that you have no demands. Psychology, psychoanalysis, is also a good guide, and the sutras of Patanjali, for instance, are very good aphorisms on ancient psychoanalysis. The word chitta used in the sutra of Patanjali is a total comprehension of psychic values. It is mano, buddhi, ahamkara, chitta all put together, the entire psychic operation which it takes into consideration when it uses a particular word chitta to form his own angle of vision. All the requirements of what we call the internal organ, the antakarana or the psyche, are comprehended in this word. An unsatisfied mind cannot become a yogi. That is the meaning.

If there is a demand from any part of our psyche inside in respect of anything in this world which has not been properly answered or responded to – the demand has not been supplied, it has been denied, or rather, suppressed or shunted back – there will be an angry snake sitting inside a hole who will try to project its head out through any aperture whenever opportunities are available, and these are the submerged, unfulfilled longings of the psyche.

Our longings are mostly submerged. They are very rarely manifested outside because desires are intelligent operations. They are not dull. Every desire knows how it can fulfil itself, and it will not unload all its commodity of requirements at once on the head of anybody. It will keep something inside. As much as can be projected outside as a feasible demand will be expressed outside under conditions which are favourable for its fulfilment. It does not mean that it has not got other demands. It is ever unsatisfied. You will never satisfy the mind. The more you satisfy it, the more it will flare up like a flame which has been fed with clarified butter. The insatiability of desires is as vast as the roaring of the ocean itself due to the fact that the psyche is externally motivated in a universal fashion, and it is not one little mind thinking for one little object in the world. There is a vast sea of objective demand at the back of our psyche, which is, at its root, as big as this creation itself.

Psychoanalysts such as Carl Jung and philosophers such as Schopenhauer have gone into the details of this terrific fact that is at the back of our psyche, which they call the universal will or the collective unconscious, etc., making out that we are not such simple persons as we appear outside. We are not innocent little babies that can be handled. No. We cannot be easily handled. We are uncontrollable. Naughty is the mind. That is why it has been said in these verses of the Bhagavadgita that we have to move with caution, weaning ourselves slowly from outer attractions. And about our attitude to our loves and hatreds in this world, our likes and dislikes and our demands for certain things, something will be told us in the coming verse. The Bhagavadgita is very careful. It does not give us hasty recipes, unthought-of prescriptions. The great master who spoke the Bhagavadgita seems to know even the little weaknesses of man. He is a very good teacher, a very good psychologist, though the greatest master you can conceive of. It is not expected of us to repress our longings. About that we shall speak afterwards.

*****

To be continued

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