Joy of being: Practical life and spiritual path

January 12, 2012 08:04 pm | Updated July 25, 2016 08:34 pm IST

Armed with the aspiration, faith and if possible the support of a mentor, the next step has got to be to try and stop judging oneself and others. How do we do this? The only way is that whenever a thought arises which judges oneself or others, we must withdraw our sanction to that thought. Sri Aurobindo calls it ‘to watch the thought'. This means, we do not identify with the thought but sit above and watch it. What happens when we sit above and watch. The thought will run for some time and then lose its fuel and stop. Out of habit, we will stop observing and refuel it by adding the next sequence to the thought! All of us can experiment with this in our day to day activities when we watch something without thoughts but the time gap we allow is so low between no fuel & refueling that it seems almost continuous. Our Mind is like the anxious vehicle owner who worries he will run out of fuel and constantly refills! Therefore, the withdrawal of sanction means to not identify but never to fight the thought (as fighting will add fuel to the fire of thoughts raging inside our Minds and substitute one fire for another only). Here again, it has to become a habit as otherwise it seems too difficult, but practise in not only thoughts but also as a general rule observing things is the only way to make this happen. When we become the observer, we pass through the different layers of our Mind till we have identified ourselves with the highest part of our being which is actually the Ego (Aham Vriti). However since the word Ego (normally associated with the separated Mind consciousness which assumes it has a Life independent of the Reality) has a negative connotation, we can understand it as the highest part of our Mind-Body-Senses consciousness.

The next practice is to reduce our desire for possessing things or persons. Again this has to be done by reducing our sanction to wanting to possess. The process will be the same as before, i.e. when the desire to possess arises we must not give sanction to it. Then should we not possess anything – a house or vehicle etc. No, we can and we should but whenever the Mind or thought which enjoys not the usage but the feeling of ownership arises, we have to stop further strengthening it or identifying with the same by observing it. Once we observe the thought or feeling it automatically dies away. You can practice and see this for yourself when relaxed and not overly engrossed in our current thoughts. The way to explain this is “ I am not the thought but the observer”. The Mind is thinking not I, has to become real. Eckhart Tolle gives a beautiful example of this. He asks - do we say “ I digest my food”. No, we say the stomach is digesting. However we have conditioned ourselves to believe “I” and the Mind (thought) are one. This habit has to be broken.

Another issue to be understood is when we are still identified with our own thoughts or habits (especially negative ones – Eckhart Tolle calls them pain bodies) we will negate the Truth by actually lamenting our fate or run away from trying to become positive by citing a lack of will, fear etc.

Sometimes one more problem arises. The thoughts or reactions are too strong to allow us to not identify. We become engrossed and stressed not in action but in worrying or thinking/analyzing. At that time, it is imperative that one associates oneself with persons of great positive energy who would by the sheer force of their personality pull us up or by giving the right advise ( of becoming the observer) place us on the right path again. If no such person is available – books or articles which lead us in that path or give a positive exposure should be read. As a last and poorer alternative of turning away from a negative downward spiral, resorting to positive action or the company of friends who have positive energy can be attempted. These actions are like charging a tired battery and hence should be resorted to at periodic intervals. Also since we may not be forewarned when the stresses of life will cause us to lose awareness or the power of observation, it is better we provide time on a day to day basis for the above activities or at least at periodic and regular intervals so that we do not lose ourselves and wrongly identify ourselves with our thoughts again and again.

(To be continued)

Feedback and questions may be e-mailed to: joyofbeingrd@gmail.com

(The writer is the Joint Managing Director of TVS & Sons Ltd., and MD, TVS Logistics)

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