The Masking Of The Intellect

When I ask anyone, what do you want in life, the answer is happiness. When I ask, happiness for how long, the answer is infinite happiness for ever. What is this state of infinite happiness? When we try to define happiness, one way could be a state where the mind is absolutely peaceful without any worries for an extended period of time. During our waking state, we enjoy the world, but at the same time are worried over something or other. Even as I enjoy the lovely Switzerland, there is a worry in my mind about the work I have to do when I get back. How about in my dream state? Sure, I am happy when I dream of dating the lovely Miss Universe. But how long is the happiness? As soon as her well built 220 lb boyfriend comes, my joy is gone! Now, let us look at deep sleep. Do I care what happens when I am in deep sleep? Someone may call me a donkey and I wont even know. Do I have worries of work? Absolutely not! So, here is a state where I am peaceful and without any worries. What if the same state of peace and lack of worries exists in waking state? Would that not be bliss?

All of us who have been students of spirituality are aware that this state of bliss is not somewhere far off. We ourselves are that Infinite state of happiness referred to as Brahman. If we are Brahman or that infinite happiness, why do we experience worries or distress? It is the innate Ignorance that is a characteristic of Brahman that creates the illusion of being separate from Brahman and creates all these worries and distress. Now, how can we remove this ignorance? Can we go to the market and buy some ignoricide to kill ignorance? Obviously not!.  The only way to remove ignorance is by using our intellect. I can almost sense most people telling themselves, this is something we have and patting their back! Well, intellect is not same as intelligence acquired by reading a book or going to college. Intellect is that ability to discriminate between what is real which is the Brahman or state of bliss and the unreal world full of illusory happiness and worries. This sounds rather woolly. Let me give an illustration.

A man parachuted from an airplane and landed in a dense forest. As he tried to figure out the terrain, wild animals started chasing him. He started running fast and to his dismay saw a witch with wide open mouth waiting for him. Dismayed at this, he ran in another direction, stepped over some leaves which unfortunately were covering a pit and fell down. head downwards and legs up. As he was falling, his legs got entangled in some creepers and he did not fall. As his eyes adjusted to the pit, he looked down and saw a huge cobra at the bottom of the pit. As he looked up, he saw two rats gnawing away at the creepers holding his legs and preventing his fall to the cobra. As he was falling, he had disturbed a beehive and now the bees were stinging his body. However, there was a smile on the man's face. From the beehive, honey was dripping and falling on his lips. As he savored the sweetness of the honey, he was smiling.

You may wonder at the absolute foolishness of the man. But let us ask ourselves. Are we not like that man? We get parachuted into the jungle of life when we are born. As we try to make our way in this world, we are pursued by various diseases. As we continue in life, the evil witch of old age is waiting for us. The cobra of death is waiting for us and we are held on to life. The 2 rats of day and night rapidly eat into our lives and with each passing day, we are nearer to death. We are stung every moment of our lives by desires, worries, failures etc. But we forget all this and smilingly enjoy that honey of some happiness. Is this not absolute lack of intellect?

In most of our cases, unfortunately the intellect is clouded which is sad because that is the only instrument we have in our search for bliss. It is like being given a knife to cut a fruit, but unfortunately the knife has lost all its sharpness. What is it that clouds our intellect and makes it practically useless? It is the various desires that we have that clouds the intellect. The degree of masking of the intellect depends on the level or type of desires.

The following are the broad categories of desires and related masking of the intellect:

1. Tamasic desires: These are the hardest set of desires which are difficult to give up, almost impossible. These consist of addictions like drinking, gambling to name  a few. For those inflicted with tamasic desires, the search for infinite bliss through the intellect is almost impossible. Their belief is that their addiction itself is their source of bliss. It is not just a belief, but a firm conviction that they are right in pursuing their desires to get happiness. Several lifetimes may have to be spent before these desires are exhausted and the individual even has a chance to realize that an instrument called the intellect exists and it can be used to pursue true bliss.

2. Rajasic desires : These are also intense desires, but not an addiction like in the earlier case. There is an intense desire to acquire wealth, power. For individuals with these intense desires, there is a glimmer of hope. It is like seeing smoke. You know fire is somewhere around and once the smoke settles, one can see the fire. Similarly in these individuals, with the right type of practice, the intellect can be awakened and sharpened to search for the infinite bliss.

3. Satvic desires : These are the desires to serve humanity, do good etc. For such individuals, the intellect is almost available to pursue the infinite bliss. It is like dust covering a mirror. It is easy to wipe the dust off the mirror  and be able to see oneself in the mirror. Similarly satvic desires clouding the intellect can be wiped out relatively easily and enable the intellect to pursue the shining Self.

In conclusion, all of us are basically immortal and blissful. It is only the intellect that has the capability to pursue the path to realize this immense bliss. The clouding of the intellect can be removed through sustained practice. The paths are many to cleanse the intellect. One can pursue the path of selfless action also called as Karma yoga or follow the path of absolute devotion with an attitude of gratitude, called as Bhakti yoga or pursue the path of understanding the difference between the real and unreal through the path of Jnana yoga. There is no single guaranteed path for success. Each individual has to find a correct mix of the above three in their individual exercise of cleansing the intellect and acquiring the state of infinite bliss.



As readers may be aware, 3 of my books on spirituality are available on Amazon.com.

I invite readers of my blog to try any of the books and give me feedback so that I can make changes in the next edition.


1. My Humble Understanding  Of Spirituality


My Humble Understanding Of Spirituality

2. Attain Infinite Bliss

Attain Infinite Bliss - A Spiritual Guide

3. The Spirit Of Spirituality

The Spirit Of Spirituality

Happy Birthday

Recently I celebrated  a milestone birthday in my life. I am grateful for the several people who wished me on my birthday. It was also a moment for me to reflect on birthdays in general and the concept of birth.

Why should I celebrate my birthday? What is so great about my birth that it deserves a celebration? Did I do anything to cause my birth? Before most people move their heads vigorously and say no way I am responsible for my birth, I request people to hold off on saying that.

We will have to understand some analogies before understanding the principle of birth. All of us know energy is universal and can neither be created nor destroyed. We also know that energy has many forms and let's take electrical energy as one of the forms. Now assume that this electricity flows through several bulbs and they get lit instantly. So the flow of energy has brought life to a bulb and it is lit and is useful. In the absence of electricity, the bulb is an useless item that serves no purpose. Now, what is the bulb made of? It is made of glass, copper wire etc. What is glass made of? One of the component is silicon. As we go deeper and deeper, finally we say, a bulb is composed of atoms, further down to protons and electrons and further down to quarks and so on. What is a human body made of? Again a series of minerals which break down into cells and further into atoms and so on. So a human body finally is no different in its basic elements than a light bulb. Just as a light bulb is useless without electricity, a human body is useless without an equivalent energy called as "Consciousness". This is the life principle or Truth principle or God, whatever one may call. So, here is the first principle. An inert set of elements change to a living element when the enlivening principle or consciousness flows through them.

Does this mean that the birth of a lighted bulb is the same as the birth of life? There is one key difference. The bulb did not have a choice. It did not ask to be created as big bulb, small bulb or whatever. But when life is created, the created life has made a conscious choice. I am sure people are sighing and telling this is crazy. Before you move on to the next article, please bear with me as i develop the concept. To understand this concept, we need to go to our familiar structure of an individual. An individual is composed of a gross body which are the internal and external organs which as you would surely have guessed are made of inert matter just like a light bulb. Below the gross body is the subtle body consisting of the mind and intellect. Below the subtle body is the causal body. The causal body is the storehouse of all desires. It is like a container of all unfulfilled desires and depending on which desire has become most urgent, and depending on whether the right environment is available, the desire sprouts into a life form.  As a farmer, I may have a variety of seeds and farmland all over the world. There is absolutely no use me putting seeds in a drought hit area and expect that it will give rise to a tree. However, the same seed once there is rain, can give rise to a tree. So for a tree to come up, both the right seed and the right environment are needed. In exactly the same way, for a life to manifest in a particular form, a set of desires and the right environment have to be present.

If a farmer has a desire to harvest mangoes, he will plant mango seeds and a mango tree will come up in the right circumstance. Here the farmer has taken a conscious decision and he is getting what he wanted. In exactly, the same way, we make a decision in terms of what sort of form we want and where depending on the seeds of desire. Does this mean that at this very instant, in terms of the type of desires I have, I am already planting the seeds of my future life. Absolutely right! I am a millionaire today. I decide to stop working and spend lavishly. I am planting the seeds of my own financial disaster. I am a healthy individual and start smoking. I am planting the seeds of my own health disaster. I am having deep unfulfilled desires which cannot be met in present circumstances. I am planting the seeds of my own birth in future in a form and environment where I can fulfill those desires. Recently I was seeing a TV show about a kid who is hardly 2 and is an expert at throwing balls into a basket. He has been shown on TV challenging basketball stars like Kobe and Magic Johnson. I doubt if there is anyway to explain this and any similar prodigies without at least a grudging acceptance that there was something before birth that has propelled the child into this skill or behavior. My hypothesis, till I am challenged and shown a better explanation is that this entity had a deep desire to be a basketball player and for some reason that was unfulfilled and the desire was so strong that the entity took birth in an American family where basketball is encouraged. So the entity has a opportunity to fulfill its desire. The seed of desire was laid in some birth and it fructified in the child being born in an environment where its desires can be met.

Does it mean every desire will be fulfilled in the form of a life? Absolutely. But unfortunately, the entity has no control over what type of desires it has, both conscious and sub-conscious, their intensity and in what combination, the desires will be combined to give a form of life. Assume you are sitting in a covered carriage. There is one engine pulling it in the north direction at say 30 miles/hour and there is another engine pulling it at 40 miles/hour in the eastern direction, then the carriage will move in the north east direction at 50 miles/hour. So, if an entity has a burning desire to be healthy and a burning desire to study well, it may be born in a well to do family. But then an entity does not have just one or two desires. Relax for a minute and list out your top desires. Before long, you will have a list filling a whole page. So, a combination of a set of most urgent desires come together and create a form and the birth happens in that environment where the desires can be fulfilled. 

So maybe I had a burning desire to write, be comfortable, study etc. These set of desires found a fertile environment in the lives of my parents and I was born in that environment where I had a chance to fulfill my desires. Does this mean, that just because desires are there, they will be fulfilled in a birth? Absolutely not! The Universe creates an environment and places the entity in the environment where it can fulfill its desires. But it is up to the free will of the entity whether it wants to flourish or not.  I am already hearing some of you say, all do not have freewill.That's correct. Any life form other than a human being does not have a freewill. They are all programmed to act based on their basic quality which comes from desires. If I have a deep desire for blood, it is likely I will be born as a wild animal and will be programmed to kill and taste blood. There is no free will. A tiger cannot make a decision whether to kill a young deer or spare a deer because it has a child. It will just do whatever it is programmed to do. This is the difference of human birth. Though a human birth also happens because of desires, a human has the ability to think and has a free will. I may have been born in an environment where I can study and fulfill my desire to write. However if I do not exercise my free will correctly and waste the opportunity given by the environment, my desires will remain unfulfilled. 

Conclusion

Our life is not accidental. Our life is not due to just a result of a physical act. We create our own environment and shape. As human beings we have the free will to either use the environment to flourish and get our desires fulfilled and at the same time use free will not to use the environment to fulfill bad desires. Every action we take, every unfulfilled desire we have at every moment of our life are the seeds for the form of life we will take in future.

As readers may be aware, 3 of my books on spirituality are available on Amazon.com.

I invite readers of my blog to try any of the books and give me feedback so that I can make changes in the next edition.


1. My Humble Understanding  Of Spirituality


My Humble Understanding Of Spirituality

2. Attain Infinite Bliss

Attain Infinite Bliss - A Spiritual Guide

3. The Spirit Of Spirituality

The Spirit Of Spirituality

A Deep Drive Into Desires

Everyone of us has desires in life and it is the very foundation on which we exist. Desires seem so natural that most of us fail to go deep into desires and understand what they truly are, how they originate and what happens if they r fulfilled or not fulfilled. I hope to go deep into the subject of desires in this article.

Types of desires

What is a desire? Desire as defined in the dictionary is, a strong feeling of wanting to have something or wishing for something to happen.

Desire can be at different levels:

1. Physical or body based desire which revolves around satisfying the 5 sense organs and executed by the 5 action organs. I desire something sweet and it is executed by the legs which gets the sweet, the hand that delivers the sweet to the mouth and the tongue that savors it.

2. Mind or emotional desires which revolve around desires in the mind not related to physical desires. I may have a desire to be loved for which I will go to my loved ones. I may have a desire to feel happy for which I will go to a movie or an excursion.

3. Intellectual or conceptual desires revolving around a feeling of status, identity etc. I have a desire to feel an identity with a group. Hence I declare I am Indian, Brahmin whatever. I have a desire to feel important in office. Hence I strive for a promotion. I desire to show i am a high status individual. Hence I strive to get a BMW.

The intensity of a desire is not the same for all desires. The intensity varies depending on age, environment etc. I may intensely desire a toy car when I am 3 years old, but will surely not have the same intense desire when I am 20. 

In addition desires can be either binding or non-binding. A non-binding desire is that where if desire is not fulfilled, there is no major internal disturbance. On the other hand a binding desire is where the mind is disturbed badly by non-fulfillment. I may desire to win the lottery and buy a ticket. If I don't win the lottery, I wont go bonkers. This is an example of a non-binding desire. At the same time we know of desires for drugs or drinks. Once addicted, these are binding desires and non-fulfillment of the desire can lead to negative consequences.

What is the life cycle of a desire?

Do desires arise in a vacuum? Will I suddenly get a desire to go and drink? Will I out of the blue get up in the morning, rush to a store and buy a lottery ticket? Very unlikely!!. 

To understand this better, we need to understand the structure of a living entity. We have a physical body which has sense organs and action organs as also the internal organs. We have a subtle body consisting of the mind that emotes and an intellect that conceptualizes. Behind this is the causal body which is the cause of our existence in a particular form. This is the storehouse of what are called as vasanas or deep rooted desires.

Vasanas are a storehouse of our desires and thinking patterns which have evolved over several cycles of our births and deaths. It is all embedded in our ego or genes as you may call. We often see amazingly talented kids and say he is a born musician, born painter or a child prodigy. Where did this talent come from? Surely not from the parents or the environment. The child came with that talent, but from where? This is where the concept of vasanas comes in. Life is a never ending cycle during which each of us accumulate experiences which get embedded in us as our basic nature which is never lost.

Depending on the vasanas or the innate nature of a person, thoughts arise. One may ask whether thoughts are driven solely by vasanas or by environment too? The environment surely provides opportunity for thoughts to arise. But the prime driver of the type of thoughts is the Vasana. Once a though arises, it results in a desire. The desire results in an action to fulfill the desire. The action causes new desires which add up to the vasanas and the cycle continues forever. 

Are desires helpful?

Desires are a part and parcel of our lives. But are desires useful? Forget the basic desire to survive. The desire for food, air, water etc are not what we mean here. We are talking of desires to acquire objects, be they physical objects,emotional objects or intellectual objects. In our quest for desires, we think of the future happiness of possessing a desired object and are unable to focus on our current life and its challenges. In trying to acquire a BMW in 5 years, I may work day and night and not enjoy the joy of my child's first walk, the first talk etc and then it is too late. If I realize that the BMW is way beyond my means, I may resort to some crooked ways to make up so that I can buy the fancy BMW. I am sure readers will agree that all the corruption we see in the environment is due to desires to  acquire objects.

What happens if desires are not met? We get angry at the element that is preventing us from acquiring the object of desire and take steps to eliminate that element. If a parent is preventing me from fulfilling my desire of drinking, i may resort to stealing to get money for drinks. If a colleague is competing with me for a promotion, I may ensure roadblocks to him so as to eliminate him. In grave situations, we know that people have resorted to violence and murder to ensure they get their object of desire. What happens if an object of desire is got by someone else. Then there is intense jealousy. If another man gets the lovely girl i was dating or a colleague gets a promotion I was hoping for, there is intense jealousy which ruins me. What if I get the object of desire? I get a brand new BMW. I am worried whether someone will scratch it, whether there will be a accident. A small scratch on the BMW results in a scratch on my heart. If I get that beautiful woman as my wife, there is a fear of losing her. So any object of desire once acquired creates fear of losing and anxiety.

Finally, just because I get an object of desire, will it end? If I get a BMW and the next day, my colleague gets a Rolls Royce, my happiness at getting a BMW is gone. After getting a lovely spouse, if my neighbor marries an even more beautiful woman, my happiness is gone. 

Can we give up desires?

It is not possible to give up desires. Even if I were to run away to Himalayas, desires will still continue in the mind and without any avenue for fulfilling the desires, the frustration will be higher.

There is a hierarchy of desires. Lower level desires fall off as we aspire for higher desires. My desire for a toy will fall off when I desire a bicycle and that desire will fall off when I desire a car and so on. The only way to reduce impact of desires is to focus on a higher desire. Desire to serve a country, community etc though binding desires at a minimum give a higher level of satisfaction due to the inclusiveness aspect and reduction of selfishness. When we do any action with a higher purpose, it is unlikely that there will be a desire to acquire objects. If i am totally focused on social work, it is unlikely that I will desire a Rolex watch. 

But the real key to giving up desires is to understand our true self. We are actually infinite and fully blessed. Due to inherent ignorance, we assume we are the puny complex of body/mind/intellect and create a vacuum between the infinite reality or Self and the assumed puny self. Nature abhors a vacuum and in this case too, to fill the vacuum, we try to get objects of desire. But no matter, ho much objects we get, the vacuum can never be filled. The only way is to remove our ignorance and realize we already have everything and we are infinite. How do we give up ignorance? How do we remove darkness from a centuries old cave? We light a lamp! Similarly, to remove the ignorance associated with several cycles of birth and death, the only cure is Knowledge. It is the knowledge of the self and true identity alone that can remove ignorance and prevent us from the effects of desires.

As readers may be aware, 3 of my books on spirituality are available on Amazon.com.

I invite readers of my blog to try any of the books and give me feedback so that I can make changes in the next edition.


1. My Humble Understanding  Of Spirituality


My Humble Understanding Of Spirituality

2. Attain Infinite Bliss

Attain Infinite Bliss - A Spiritual Guide

3. The Spirit Of Spirituality

The Spirit Of Spirituality