Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 12

The enlightened vision and the benevolent disposition by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 12

Spiritual knowledge is a therapy for the soul. Just as medical knowledge brings with it the responsibility to help the sick, so does spiritual knowledge.

The enlightened vision is expected to foster a benevolent disposition in all transcendentalists. Not just devotees, but also impersonalists who are lower in the spiritual hierarchy. The Bhagavad-gitaenjoins twice (05.25, 12.04) that those seeking the all-pervading spirit, Brahman, strive for the welfare of all living beings (sarva bhuta hite ratah).

Impersonalists need to be benevolent because their spiritual path requires them to see Brahman everywhere. Accordingly, they need to see others not as products of matter, but as sparks of spirit. And help them come from material illusion to spiritual truth.

The path of bhakti spiritually enriches this vision in three significant ways:

Others are not just particles of spirit, but are parts of Krishna. All living beings are the children of Krishna; we are all members of the same one family.

The reality towards which we can guide others is much sweeter and far more attractive than the passive peace of Brahman realization. That ultimate reality is the dynamic spiritual world permeated with ecstatic love for Krishna.

For progressing spiritually, others don’t have to depend only on their own discrimination and determination. By rendering devotional service to Krishna, they can get his grace in the form of higher wisdom and higher taste. Both these make it much easier to go from illusion to reality.

Having such a rich spiritual vision, devotees are naturally benevolent towards everyone. In fact, the Bhagavad-gita (12.13) recommends such benevolence as the first among the characteristics of devotees. (adveshta sarva-bhutanam maitrah karuna)

By our daily devotional practices, we aspiring devotees can internalize the enlightened vision and benevolent disposition.

Bhagavad Gita Chapter 12 Text 04

“But those who fully worship the unmanifested, that which lies beyond the perception of the senses, the all-pervading, inconceivable, unchanging, fixed and immovable – the impersonal conception of the Absolute Truth – by controlling the various senses and being equally disposed to everyone, such persons, engaged in the welfare of all, at last achieve Me.”

Don’t sensationalize sensations

Don’t sensationalize sensations by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 02, Text 14

The sensations of taste, touch, smell, sight and sound are the sources of sensual pleasures. Such pleasures are the goals of materialism, the worldview that holds matter to be the primary, or even the only, thing in existence.

Materialism sensationalizes sensations, making them seem to be far more enjoyable than what they actually are – fleeting stimulations of bodily nerves. Contemporary culture abuses technology to further sensationalize sensations by depicting prominently the most seductive sense objects. However, such sense objects being few are unachievable for most people. So, the ubiquitous depiction of such sense objects fuels within people insatiable cravings that torment them endlessly.

Tolerance essentially means stopping our imagination from sensationalizing pleasant sensations and avoiding their sensationalized depictions externally.

While we can’t stop the social sensationalization of sensations, we can stop its individual sensationalization. That is, with our intelligence, we can stop our imagination from fantasizing about sensations. Gita wisdom empowers our intelligence by explaining our spiritual identity as souls meant to delight in eternal love for the all-attractive Supreme, Krishna.

The Bhagavad-gita (02.14) urges us to tolerate sensations such as heat-cold and pleasure-pain by meditating on their temporary material nature, as contrasted with our eternal spiritual nature. We normally think of tolerating unpleasant things and enjoying pleasant things, so why does the Gita urge us to tolerate both unpleasant and pleasant sensations? Because the two go together, like the two sides of a coin. To the extent we delight in pleasant sensations, to that extent our consciousness gets materially entangled, thereby forcing us to suffer unpleasant sensations too. Hence the need to tolerate pleasant sensations, which essentially means stopping our imagination from sensationalizing them and avoiding their sensationalized depictions externally. By such tolerance, we gradually disentangle our consciousness from matter.

Is tolerance an exercise in self-denial? Not when we practice bhakti-yoga, for this yoga of love connects us with Krishna and provides higher happiness far more fulfilling than the most sensationalized sensations.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 02

The soul seems far out because it is far in by ChaitanyaCharan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 02

Some people think that the concept of the soul is far out because it seems incomprehensible or even unbelievable.

Yes, the soul is difficult to understand because it is far in. That is, it exists at the innermost core of our being, at a level of existence that we aren’t habituated to comprehend or even consider.

We are usually captivated by external material things, for we believe that possessing them will bring joy and losing them will bring misery. And as our physical body exists in this outer world and is the vehicle for interacting with it, we naturally identify ourselves with the body. When the pursuit of externals agitates our mind, we try to pacify it by various self-help techniques. If we do experience some relief, we start identifying ourselves with the mind, often mistaking it to be the soul.

The more we relish devotional fulfillment, the more the reality of the spiritual realm becomes evident to us.

But Gita wisdom explains that the mind is also material, albeit subtle material – and that the soul exists beyond the mind. Pertinently, the Bhagavad-gita (02.29) acknowledges that the soul is difficult to understand.

Though the soul exists far in, we can take our consciousness inwards and perceive it by the practice of yoga. Among various processes of yoga, bhakti-yoga spiritualizes our consciousness fastest because it connects us with the most attractive being at the spiritual level: Krishna. Connecting with him through devotional remembrance provides sublime, ineffable, transcendental fulfillment – something profoundly different from whatever we have experienced at the physical or mental levels. The more we relish this fulfillment, the more the reality of the spiritual realm becomes evident.

By steady yoga practice we realize our true identity as the eternal-conscious-blissful soul, radically different from the temporary-insentient-miserable material body. Then we understand that what is far out is not identifying ourselves as the soul, but misidentifying ourselves with the body.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 10 .

Don’t just be mindful – make the mind full of Krishna by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 10 .

Many self-help teachers recommend mindfulness – cultivating awareness and living in the present. Certainly, mindfulness is better than absent-mindedness, but is it sufficient? Let’s analyze with an example of driving.

Being unmindful is like driving inattentively, not knowing where we are going and how we are driving – it’s unfruitful and unsafe. Becoming mindful while driving is definitely better, but still it doesn’t make driving fully fruitful. For that, we need to know our destination and the way to get there.

Similarly, to make mindfulness fully fruitful, we need to know the purpose of life itself and the means to achieve it. Gita wisdom explains that purpose – we are at our core spiritual beings meant to love the supreme spiritual being, Krishna, and delight eternally therein. And it reveals the best means: bhakti-yoga.

To spiritualize our mindfulness, we need to see the connection of the material with the spiritual, to link the things of this world with their ultimate source.

As long as we are spiritually uninformed, we remain under the sway of our material attachments. So, even if we achieve mindfulness, we become better aware of material things, but not of spiritual things.

To spiritualize our mindfulness, we need to see the connection of the material with the spiritual, to link the things of this world with their ultimate source. In the Bhagavad-gita (10.17), Arjuna seeks such guidance. In response, Krishna throughout the remaining chapter illustrates the concluding philosophical principle (10.17): the world’s attractive things, things that we are often mindful of, manifest a spark of his all-attractiveness. To realize this principle, we need to practice bhakti-yoga,for it sensitizes us to Krishna’s presence and helps us become mindful of him.

The more we diligently practice bhakti-yoga and become attracted to Krishna, the more our heart becomes permeated with his presence, and everything stimulates his remembrance. Thus, we rise from being mindful to being mindful of Krishna to ultimately making our mind full of Krishna.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 13

Don’t base identification on sensationby Chaitanya CharanDas Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 13

Some people argue, “How can I be anything other than my body? When it gets cut, I feel pain; when it touches something soft, I feel pleasure.”

But can we base identification on sensation, as does this argument? Suppose we get engrossed in watching a movie. If a sudden blow hits the hero, we feel as if we ourselves have been hit. Though we experience the same sensation as the movie character, we are not that character.

Whereas we can easily walk out of a movie theater, we can’t easily come out of material illusion because it is so captivating as to make us forget that we have a life beyond the material.

Similarly, philosophical introspection suggests that we are more than our body. The whole body is made of unconscious molecules, so it can’t experience anything. Then who is the experiencer, the sensor of sensations? The soul, answers the Bhagavad-gita.

Just as we get engrossed in the movie due to our desire to enjoy it, similarly, the Gita (13.22) states that we souls get engrossed in matter due to our desire to enjoy material things. Whereas we can easily walk out of a movie theater, we can’t easily come out of material illusion because it is far more captivating – it makes us forget that we have a life beyond the material.

To experience our non-material side, we need to practice yoga, which aims to curtail our experience of material sensations and channelizes our consciousness towards experience of spiritual sensations. The Gita (13.25) mentions three yogic processes – dhyana-yoga, sankhya-yoga and karma-yoga – and then (13.26) devotes a full verse to bhakti-yoga. Earlier, the Gita (06.47) has declared bhakti-yoga the topmost yoga, the yoga that connects us most intimately with the highest spiritual reality, Krishna. Through this connection, we access stimulating spiritual sensations coming from that all-attractive Supreme. By thus practicing and relishing bhakti-yoga, we gain increasing realization of our spiritual identity.

So to infer our identity correctly, we need to base it not on bodily sensation, but on philosophical introspection and yogic realization.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 17

Charity that expresses vanity ends in vanity by ChaitanyaCharan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 17

Charity is usually a noble expression of the human virtue of compassion. Few joys in life are as sublime and fulfilling as the joy of helping wiping someone’s tears or bringing a smile on their face. When done in a mood of helping others, charity expands our consciousness, by helping us tune to concerns beyond our immediate concerns.

Yet not all charity is done with the same level of consciousness – when done primarily as an expression of the ego, “Just see how good I am”, charity can keep the consciousness locked in the temptation of wanting to be a controller of matter.

The Bhagavad-gita classifies everything in material existence into a typology of three modes, wherein the modes are among other things shapers of the interaction between matter and consciousness. Normally, charity would be considered as belonging to the mode of goodness, but not always. The Gita (17.20-22) indicates that charity can be in any of the three modes.

When charity is done in the mode of passion (Gita17.21), the purpose is expanding one’s sense of power and prestige in controlling matter. Usually, those in passion control matter for their own immediate sensual gratification, but sometimes that control can be for indirect gratification by helping others enjoy matter. Such charity ends in vanity – it doesn’t take us towards liberation, nor does it grant any lasting fulfillment. Given that the Gita right from it beginning takes us from outer appearance of matter to the inner substance of soul and ultimately the Supersoul, its analysis of charity is similarly meant to take us to the substance – to prompt deeper introspection so that our external expression of charity is accompanied by an internal intention of benevolence. The highest charity is spiritual charity – the charity that helps people link spiritually with the Supersoul.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 10.

We can’t grasp the Truth – we can only let the Truth grasp us by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 10.

There can be many truths, but they are different from the Truth, the knowledge about life’s highest and deepest reality – God. While we may grasp some truths about the world by shedding our intellectual sweat, we can’t grasp thus the truth about the one who is beyond the world. It is only by divine grace that we finite beings can gain some insights into the one who is infinite. The Gita (10.11) identifies Krishna’s grace as the illuminator that dissipates inner darkness – darkness that keeps us seduced by material things and keeps our consciousness trapped at the material level.

We can’t comprehend God by stretching our intellects as someone might stretch one’s body to pull down an out-of-reach fruit on a tree.

Understanding God is not a matter of grasping but of being grasped. We can’t comprehend God by stretching our intellects as someone might stretch one’s body to pull down an out-of-reach fruit on a tree. We comprehend God by letting our consciousness be raised upwards from the material level to the spiritual level by divine grace that manifests through the process of bhakti-yoga, somewhat similar to the way a rescuing rope from a helicopter lifts a refugee out of a disaster zone.

Of course, we shouldn’t minimize the value of our God-given intelligence, but we shouldn’t over-estimate it either. Our intellectual effort is important, but it alone won’t yield fruit if we try to fathom God from our present material level of consciousness. Our intellectual effort is useful to the extent it convinces us of the dual needs to submit to the divine and to hold on to the process of grace revealed by the divine for raising our consciousness.

When the Truth, manifesting in the highest form as the supremely loving and lovable all-attractive Supreme Person Krishna, grasps us in a bond of pure spiritual love, we get elevated and liberated into a life of eternal happiness.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 09

Let repetition be a re-petition by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 09

Chanting mantras is a standard religious practice that is based on the philosophical understanding that sacred sound is packed with power. Different mantras are meant for different purposes – for example, some mantras are used during warfare to invoke celestial weapons that unleash fearsome power rarely accessible to terrestrial beings. The most special and potent among all such mantras are those that are made of the names of God because just as God is the supremely potent being, so is his name the supremely potent sound. God being absolute is non-different from his name – so his omnipotence manifests through his name.

In tapping the power of mantras centered on the names of God, the dynamic of loving reciprocation comes into play. These mantras are essentially personal calls to him for petitioning his grace. The highest manifestation of his grace is his love for all of us, because that alone can grant us lasting happiness at the spiritual level, where we as eternal souls can delight eternally.

While the mantras themselves are potent sound vibrations, the extent to which we can access their potency is determined by the receptivity of our hearts. When we strive to keep a devotional disposition while chanting the mantras, that disposition opens our heart to God’s grace. The Bhagavad-gita (09.14) mentions that the devotees chant the names and glories of Krishna constantly – and do this with devotion.

Mantras are often chanted repeatedly to better access their powers, but that repetition needs to be devotional, not mechanical.

Thus the repetition of the mantras is not meant to be a mindless mutterance of some formulaic sound. It is meant to be a re-petition, a reiteration of an earnest request for grace to flood our heart and fill it with spiritual love.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 15

The point is not to get it right, but to get it across by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 15

Scripture is not merely to be learned, but to be lived – a truth that every translator of scripture needs to constantly remember. Getting scriptural translation right means to convey scripture’s literal meaning accurately in the translated language. Getting it across means conveying the essential point intelligibly and appealingly so that scripture speaks to readers in the translated language as relevantly as it spoke in its native language to its original readers.

An excellent example of such a living translation is Srila Prabhupada’s rendition of the Bhagavad-gita (15.06). The text states that Krishna’s abode, the spiritual world, is not illumined by the sun, moon or fire. In his translation, Srila Prabhupada adds electricity to the list. Is this addition justified? Let’s consider how well it conveys the essential meaning.

A translation that is linguistically precise but practically irrelevant is a dead translation.

The verse’s main point is that the spiritual world is self-luminous, not requiring any source of illumination. Thus the spiritual world contrasts with the material world that is an inherently dark place in need of illumination. This purpose of contrasting becomes evident later (15.12) when Krishna lists the same three sources as his manifestations for illuminating this world.

Srila Prabhupada translated the Gita primarily for modern urban audiences whose most familiar source of illumination was electricity. So, for impressing on them the point of the spiritual world’s self-luminosity, his addition of electricity to the list is not just appropriate but also astute. The addition expresses the text’s import tellingly for its readers.

A translation that is linguistically precise but practically irrelevant is a dead translation. Those who live the Gita can’t tolerate offering such fossilized translations – they strive to offer the living text as they live it and as their audience can live it. Such are the translations that keep the Gita alive and bring its readers spiritually alive.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 18

Doubting is a self-deluding form of believing by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 18

Skeptics often deride believers for not being sharp enough to doubt questionable ideas.

Though skeptics may have sharp intelligence that is well used to doubt fallacious beliefs, their intelligence is often not sharp enough to doubt doubt itself, which is the foundation of their skepticism. They overlook the fact that being skeptical essentially means believing one’s doubts. So, such doubters often risk becoming deluded believers of doubt. Deluded firstly because they believe in something that keeps them forever in ignorance – doubt can only tell what is wrong, never what is right. And secondly because they often don’t recognize that they are believers too. People who are aware that they are wearing a lens can check its color and the accuracy of what they see through it, those who aren’t aware of their lens can’t check their vision. Such is often the skeptics’ plight.

Many thoughtful people have chosen belief after intelligent contemplation, as, for example, scientists like Pascal and thinkers like Emerson

Still, skeptics are right in criticizing the unthinking believing that characterizes many believers. They may be surprised, however, to know that not all believers are unthinking – many thoughtful people have chosen belief after intelligent contemplation, as, for example, scientists like Pascal (“Little science takes you away from God, but more of it takes you to him”) and thinkers like Emerson (“All I have seen teaches me to trust the Creator for all I have not seen”).

The Gita recommends this kind of deeply considered belief when it urges us (18.63) to deliberate its message before making our choice. Gitawisdom offers a comprehensive worldview that explains our identity, God’s nature, the world’s purpose, our ultimate destiny and the best means to achieve our highest potential. And it also delineates a time-honored yogic process for gaining experiential realization of higher spiritual realities.

Why should anyone let a miscalculated belief in doubt deprive oneself of such an intellectually -stimulating expansion of consciousness?

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 05

The war against lust is a war of attrition  by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 05

A war of attrition refers to a war in which victory requires wearing out the opponent. As spiritual seekers, we need to wage war against lust, the formidable illusory force that traps us in material consciousness.

However, due to our many sexual indulgences in this and previous lives, lust has entrenched itself deeply inside us. So, destroying all its inner traces is nearly impossible. And even if we could, it can still barge in at any moment from the many sexually suggestive or explicit stimuli in the outer world. Therefore, for winning the inner war, we can’t bank on eradicating lust.

Tolerating lust doesn’t mean that we tolerate lust’s making us act sinfully; it means that we tolerate lust’s inner presence without acting sinfully.

The Bhagavad-gita (05.23) recommends a more realistic strategy – lifelong tolerance. Tolerating lust doesn’t mean that we tolerate lust’s  making us act sinfully; it means that we tolerate lust’s inner presence without acting sinfully. This implies that we endure lusty thoughts, that may come from outside or inside, without succumbing to improper actions.

Tolerating lust thus requires attrition warfare – we need to wear lust out without being worn out by it. The prospect of having to battle lust lifelong may seem demanding and disheartening. Thankfully however, the fight becomes easier when we optimize our nourishment and minimize lust’s nourishment. We get nourished by remembering and serving Krishna because such devotional service grants spiritual fulfillment, thereby providing strength to resist sensual pleasures. Lust gets nourished whenever we succumb to sexual indulgence; so, conversely, each time we resist temptation, we weaken lust. We automatically resist temptation when we keep ourselves busy in bhakti-yoga.

Pertinently, this verse concludes that those thus engaged are fixed in yoga (yuktah) and are happy (sukhi). This indicates that when we fight the war of attrition with the proper strategy of positive yogic engagement, we find fulfillment during the war itself, what to speak of on attaining victory.

Free love is a self-contradiction by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 18

Some people advocate sexual licentiousness by touting it as free love. As we cherish both freedom and love, their combination sounds irresistibly appealing. Consequently, we often don’t realize that the idea of “free love” is a self-contradiction – love by its very nature binds the lover to the beloved.

No doubt, we can freely choose whom to love. But once we choose, love by its very nature centers on committing ourselves to acting for the pleasure and the welfare of our beloved – and that implies losing the freedom to act in ways that displease or harm the beloved. Of course, we won’t even feel the desire to act in such ways when our love is deep; we will be happily absorbed in expressing and deepening our love by appropriate actions. However, when our love is superficial, we will feel as if we have lost our freedom, and may become campaigners for free love.

Though free lovers may bring their bodies in contact with many other bodies, their hearts stay isolated and desolate, due to their love-stifling aversion to commitment.

But free love frequently boils down to no love. The so-called free lovers are often among the loneliest people in the world – though they may bring thier bodies in contact with many other bodies, their hearts stay isolated and desolate, due to their love-stifling aversion to commitment.

The impossibility of free love doesn’t mean, however, that our twin aspirations for freedom and love can never be reconciled and fulfilled – they can be, at the spiritual level. When we realize our identity as souls and commit ourselves to loving the supreme soul Krishna, we ultimately attain his eternal abode. There, our love becomes truly free – free from distraction by self-centered impurities; free from interruption by worldly anxieties; and free from termination by death.

So, when Krishna invites us in the Bhagavad-gita (18.65) to love him and assures that by so doing we will attain his abode, he is calling us to authentic free love.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 09

Some people say, “Prayer is a state of being – it’s not something that you do; it’s something that you are.”

Actually, this state refers not so much to prayer as to prayerfulness, an inner attitude of absorption in God. Certainly such prayerfulness is a spiritually evolved state of consciousness that we all should aspire for. But we can’t actualize this aspiration merely by imagining that we have it – we need to cultivate it by consciously engaging in appropriate activities.

Consider, for example, how people become absorbed in cricket – by watching cricket, playing cricket, reading cricket, talking cricket, dreaming cricket. Thus, repeated intentional engagement in a thing engenders constant absorption in it. This principle applies all the more so to God because he is not perceivable at the material level of reality where our consciousness is at present.

By tapping the symbiotic relationship between prayerfulness and prayer, we can enter into ever-intensifying divine absorption.

To spiritually stimulate our consciousness, we need to conscientiously engage in activities such as praying that invoke God’s presence. And we need to go to places such as temples where his presence is more easily perceivable. When we thus regularly bask our consciousness in his presence, our connection with him deepens, and eventually his presence permeates our entire being.

Significantly, the Bhagavad-gita (09.14) states that advanced spiritualists strive to engage constantly in devotional activities such as kirtan (a collective prayer). This indicates that even the spiritually evolved engage in prayer – not because they need to, but because they love to. Just as we naturally express externally any emotion that strongly animates us internally, so do advanced spiritualists naturally express their devotion. And this outer expression subsumes their senses in an experience of God, thereby intensifying their inner absorption. Thus prayerfulness, far from replacing prayer, reinforces it.

By tapping the symbiotic relationship between prayerfulness and prayer, we can enter into ever-intensifying divine absorption.

There’s more to devotion than rules, not less by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita

Some people claim, “There’s more to bhakti than rules – it’s a matter of the heart.”

Yes, it is. But presently our heart is much more attracted to worldly things than to Krishna. The rules of bhakti-yoga help us to correct this. Its proscriptions decrease our worldly attachments by minimizing our contact with entangling material things. And its prescriptions stimulate our attraction for Krishna by ensuring our regular engagement in devotional activities that connect us with him. The Bhagavad-gita (12.09) assures that the practice of bhakti-yoga will increase our attraction to him.

Just as those who give up the road and go cross-country make their journey tougher, similarly, those who give up the rules of bhakti make their spiritual progress tougher.

To understand bhakti dynamics better, let’s compare the rules of bhakti-yoga to a road for traveling. Traveling involves more than just moving along a road – it requires moving purposefully towards a destination. Similarly, devotion involves more than just following rules for the sake of following them – it involves following them with the desire to love Krishna. But just as those who give up the road and go cross-country make their journey tougher, similarly, those who give up the rules of bhakti make their devotional journey tougher. In fact, as compared to a cross-country outer journey, a rule-less inner journey is more obstacle-filled. Why? Because whereas outer places are inert, inner attachments are active – they repeatedly allure us back to worldly objects. To resist those lures, we need the periodic purification coming from disciplined devotional practice.

The importance of rules in bhakti doesn’t mean that those who can’t follow rules are disqualified from bhakti – no, the next verse(12.10) indicates that they can work for Krishna till they become purified enough to follow rules and eventually attain perfection. Bhakti accommodates those who humbly acknowledge their inability to follow rules, but those who presumptuously reject the need for rules and imagine that they are already devotees unfortunately place themselves outside bhakti’s accommodativeness.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 18

One of our greatest mental energy wasters is the craving to be someone else, “If only I was like that person who has better looks, greater memory, more wealth …”

This craving stems largely from society’s disproportionate glamorization of certain material vocations and positions – a glamorization that impels us to seek achievements even if we aren’t endowed for them. TheBhagavad-gita (18.47) disapproves such indiscriminate pursuits when it urges us to act according to our sva-dharma, not adopt others’ sva-dharma. In the social system of varnashrama recommended in the Gita (04.13), our sva-dharma is determined by our abilities and activities, thereby ensuring that it harmonizes with our nature and provides inner satisfaction, irrespective of outer position.

We need to improve ourselves, but that improvement is centered on inner purification, not outer imitation.

The material hierarchy that society accords to different vocations can cause dissatisfaction, but only as long as our material vocation stays divorced from a unifying and universal spiritual purpose – to activate our relationship with Krishna. Gita wisdom assures us that we all are eternal souls who have an individual unique relationship with Krishna. That relationship is the source of life’s highest fulfillment. And it can be activated by whatever we do, if we just do it in a mood of devotion, as the Gita (09.27) assures.

Ultimately, there is a divine plan that underlies what we are presently. If Krishna had wanted someone else to love and serve him, he would have made someone else. He wants you and he wants me – and that’s the reason you are you and I am I. Of course, we both need to improve ourselves so that our relationship with him can deepen. But that improvement is centered on inner purification, not outer imitation. We don’t have to become someone else – we simply have to realize and relish who we actually are.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita

What is violence for the infectant is benevolence for the infected by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita

Suppose a doctor neglected treating a patient, despite having the necessary capacity. Such negligence would be culpable negligence – in doing nothing, the doctor would be doing a serious wrong.

Similarly, if a martial guardian of society remained inactive when anti-social elements wrecked havoc, that inaction would be culpable negligence. Aptly, the Bhagavad-gita (03.04) cautions that inaction doesn’t exempt one from liability to reaction.

Taking the medicine metaphor further, we normally consider a doctor’s actions benevolent, but they are violent from the perspective of the germs infecting the patient. Yet what is violent for the infectant is benevolence for the infected. Such is the nature of life in material existence, wherein the life of one living being requires the death of another.

While survival of the fittest is the law of existence for subhuman species, we humans are not meant to govern ourselves by our lower nature that coincides with the nature of subhuman beings. Instead, we are meant to govern ourselves by our higher spiritual nature as souls who delight in loving and being loved. The principles that enable us to realize and actualize this higher nature comprise the essence of dharma. Thus, dharma is not some arbitrary set of religious codes imposed from outside, but an organic pathway for the progressive expression of our latent spiritual nature that thrives on loving and being loved.

Unfortunately, many spiritually retrograde elements in society choose to live according to their lower nature, seeking paramountcy by victimizing the weak. To curb such anti-social elements, the martial guardians of society need to adopt assertive, even aggressive, measures when necessary. Though some peaceniks may disapprovingly label such corrective action as violence that they feel must be eschewed at all costs, Gita wisdom helps us see such action not as violence, but as benevolence.

Don’t just see the provision – see the provider by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 09

As eco-awareness is increasing, more people are appreciating how dependent we all are on nature. Without nature’s provision of our basic necessities, we wouldn’t be able to live.

Yet this desirable eco-awareness can morph into an obsessive fixation with nature that manifest philosophically as naturalism. By seeing nature as the be-all and the end-all, naturalism exiles God and replaces him with nature. Naturalism comprises a dead-end in our spiritual evolution.

While all living beings depend on nature, we humans have the intelligence to appreciate its complexity and intricacy – an appreciation that can be enhanced through scientific study when done open-mindedly. But we also have a higher intelligence to perceive something more – the divine hand behind nature. The Bhagavad-gita (09.10) reminds us that nature works under Krishna’s supervision.

An infant eats whatever food is provided without thinking where it comes from, but a child notes that putting some coins in a machine provides readymade food such as sandwiches. And an adult understands that behind the machine is the intelligence of the maker, who has set up the system by which food is provided.

Similarly, the subhuman living beings simply live on nature, without consciously contemplating the source of things. Whatever eco-friendly behavior they exhibit is simply due to biological instinct, not conscious cogitation. We humans when we rise slightly above the force of biological drives learn to contemplate the complex natural mechanisms that make our existence possible. When our consciousness evolves further, we perceive that beyond these complex mechanisms is a super-intelligent transcendent maker.

The capacity to perceive spiritual reality, especially the supreme spiritual reality, is humanity’s defining privilege. When we value nature’s provision not as a lucky accident of unguided natural processes, but as the benevolence of the supervisor of nature, our spiritual evolution races towards its zenith.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita

Don’t be so concerned about others’ future destination as to be cut off from their present emotion by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on BhagavadGita

A great danger of treading the right spiritual path is a sense of self-righteousness – the pride that we know the truth makes us feel that we have the right to correct others. Often that feeling may be authentic and compassionate – we may even have the best of intentions, being concerned that, by the law of karma, they are headed towards very unfortunate destinations. But while their eventual destination is a matter of serious concern, their present emotion is a matter of immediate concern – a concern that self-righteousness often makes us blind to.

When a person has a serious disease in an initial stage, a doctor can see the grave prognosis, but the patient can’t. If the doctor starts castigating the patient for not taking proper prevention or treatment, the patient being unconvinced about the presence or the gravity of the problem may just leave the doctor.

Similarly, we can’t help others unless they want to be helped and they accept our help. And the only way they can feel the need for the help and become willing to receive the help is if they become convinced about the gravity of the problem. And they will become so convinced if they can give an open-minded hearing to the message of Gita wisdom and they will give such hearing only when they feel that we are intelligent and intelligible, that we are their genuine well-wishers.

Therefore, an important part of effective outreach is not just speaking the truth, but conducting ourselves in a way that inspires others to come closer to the truth. No wonder the Gita (03.26) urges us not to speak words that agitate the minds of others, but to encourage them to be engaged in a way that will gradually elevate them.