Why Spirituality?

Why Spirituality?

This is an important question that one should ask himself before want to pursue the path of Spirituality. The path of spirituality is different from path of rituals that are followed as spirituality now. So it is necessary for us to be clear as to why we want to pursue in the path of Spirituality

The nature of the human mind is that it always wants something or the other; because of this we undergo a series of emotions which is a never ending cycle of happiness and suffering. When a person realizes this truth and wants to transcend beyond this then his true spiritual journey begins.

Most of us are stuck at the level of Material happiness and reluctantly accept the suffering which comes along with it. We assume that all the happiness in the world can be acquired through money or material happiness is the primary source of happiness. We feel that outside objects around us is the source of happiness and try to accumulate more of it, but once you acquire what you want, there is an urge to acquire more and more. This becomes a never ending process and hence we fall in the trap of suffering.

The above point is important to understand as this realization is the stepping stone to spiritual progress. Only when we understand that outside objects is not the source of your happiness but rather is a tool to secure the body and its life for future contingencies. You will come to a profound understanding that happiness is not outside. Happiness is derived from within. The moment we understand money, objects and everything around us does not affect the way we feel about our self. We start the process of transcending this apparent material world.

Then at this crucial part of our life we try to find the answer for how we can experience true happiness and how to get over this cycle of suffering. At this stage we try to understand why am I suffering? This enquiry leads to the understanding mentioned above that attachment to material objects are the cause for suffering. Then next there is a void in our life as throughout our life we were behind money and objects and now we have now left the same. Then our mind works over time to go against the will and makes us to run behind objects again, but with will power we bring a control over our attachments. At this stage we give up objects and start having control over desires, and then we question ourselves what is the purpose of our life? Because throughout our life we were behind objects assuming that it’s the source of our happiness now that idea itself has crashed in our mind.

This is the stage where true transformation starts happening with the help of a Guru, were we start understanding the nature of our existence (because we have let go of objects and external world so only option left now is to turn inward and understand the nature of our existence). Once the renunciation of the material world beings (metaphorically as we still exist on earth only mental transformation happens) the questions like what is this life? What is the nature of the life? What is the purpose of the life? And most importantly who am I? Are the questions, that arise in the mind of the seeker. This is where he steps into spiritual path and he starts letting go of his attachment towards material world and starts understanding life by learning from a Guru, studying scripture and performing sadhana.

The spiritual seeks now learns the reason for his unhappiness and realizes that mind and ego are the source of all suffering, mind and ego gives rise to desire which is the cause of all the suffering. Then with meditation and learning from the teachings of the scriptures the apparent problems that he is facing would be of no consequence for him as he would just see all problems as the ones created by the mind, and he is not the mind or the ego but the observers of the both. At this stage he starts differentiating between himself and what is not he; through enquiry he will understand that he is not the body, prana, mind, false knowledge that he is the body and mind or the bliss arising from material object. He realizes that these are the objects of the experience and he is the observer of these. At this stage he finds true and everlasting happiness. Further he will realize that this observer which is the source of all objects is not restricted to himself but pervades everywhere as consciousness. This the ultimate stage where he realizes all is one and merges with the supreme consciousness. Getting away from the suffering permanently transcending Maya.

Note realization is not something which he creates or something that one searches for, this truth already exists but he realizes it now. At this stage realization happens and the apparent world becomes a maya for that being

Maya – The Grand Illusion

Maya – The Grand Illusion

If you go an elderly person ask what is life? They will just say that life is just a farce, they will say that things happen and we can control few and most of the other things are out of our control. We just ride the wave of what is happening to us with little or no control.

Though we feel that we have control on what we are doing or deciding, this control is conditioned by our surrounding, the way we are brought up and the habits/tendencies that we have acquired. It is these factors which have very high influence on our life which takes away our freedom and act based on the limitations that we are put into.

So these limitations that we are put into is nothing but Maya, to be precise the joy, sorrow, money, planets, talk, thought are all considered as Maya in Advaita Vedanta. To put in simple terms anything that can felt, seen, felt, understood or perceived is Maya. All that is physical is Maya.

Now this point creates lot of disturbance to people who are engaged in this world thoroughly and have difficult time agree with this point.

So why the yogi’s of the past and present say that the world and all the apparent things around is Maya, in fact Krishna say’s that world appears out of his Yoga Maya, or it arises from his yogic powers. This gives us a hint now that Maya is the power of the Brahman. This power arises out of Brahman and goes back into it. Meaning the apparent world arises out of Nirguna Brahman and goes back into the same, so one thing that remains always is Brahman and what comes and goes as a world is just nothing but a wave in the ocean of Brahman.

Now let us dwell more into this, the point here is that there is an underlying string which is the cause of all and this underlying factor gives rise to all that is. Now when there is something which is the source for the apparent world then how can the world be true existence? Its existence is completely dependent on Brahman. So now point becomes clear that world is a manifestation of Brahman.

Now people will come up with an argument that, the world is a manifestation of the God and hence there is God and from the God this world has come into being this existence and hence this existence is true as it is a manifestation from the Lord.

But Advaita goes even further to say that the world does not exist at all this world is just an appearance in the consciousness of the Brahman. This is where things get tricky. How and why do they say that this world does not exist at all?

It’s like this when a man dresses up like a women , the perceiving eye gets confused and misidentifies man to a women. Now we know that he is a man but his outer covering and dressing is making him to look like a woman but reality he is not. So man in this case is the absolute truth and looking like women is the Maya. The Man here has transformed himself to a women even though this has deceived others. Does it change the fact that he is man? No absolutely not.

Similarly the consciousness projects itself upon itself this world and assumes itself as this limited world, but this is wrong as it’s true nature is the absolute (Brahman) and the world is the projection in its consciousness. So for example if a person imagines himself to have four hands and now if he gets confused between reality and imagination and considers himself to have four hands. Does it change the fact that he has four hands? Absolutely not, so it is his mental projection (A mental image viewed as reality) which is giving raise such delusion.

This way it is quite clear that the apparent world and us are nothing but the projections in the Consciousness. It’s like we are in a child’s game where one day he build a castle and the next movement breaks it apart, similarly we are born in this projection (appear in the consciousness) and die in the same, but in reality there is no birth or death as everything is one reality i.e. Brahman. We have just put on this dress of body and discard it which is of no relevance to us as there is just Brahman.

Balance

Balance

We always talk about balance in life, what does this really mean when a person wants to lead a meaningful and fruitful life?

Balance is more to do with mind not getting afflicted with desires and addictions. In short balance can be simply explained as a state of being where a person interacts with everything and yet he is not attached to it but will enjoy the material world to the fullest.

Here the person will welcome all aspects of life as same and does not exhibit extreme emotions under any situation. Though he is subjected to pleasures and pains of life he will always experience both with a stable mind which allows him to look at the problem as an detached person rather than investing emotions into the issue.

Balanced person will view the pleasures and pains as no different to each other as after pleasure there is pain and after pain there is pleasure, such being the state of life a balanced person understands this fundamental fact and lives a life which is beyond the both, he will always look at both state of living as temporary and ever changing, which in due course of time he will discard both of them as these feelings are nothing but a problem created by the human mind and they are not real, as we can be happy for no reason if we control our mind thoroughly. To justify this let us take an analogy some people find happiness in music whereas the few think it as nothing but noise. A source of pleasure for one is a source of pain for the other. Hence here both pleasure and pain is both mental phenomenon and if mind is ignored/subdued/controlled then for such person everything is one as he has no reason to feel happy/unhappy for anything from external sources and yet he is very contented internally which leads to an inexplicable happiness beyond words.

So balance is nothing but the natural state of any being, before the mind was corrupted by various impurities of desire, ego etc.

What we have to try and achieve is this balance in life where we enjoy life to the fullest and yet we are not attached to anything.