Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita.

Spiritual happiness never goes away – it just pushes us on the way by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita.

Seekers sometimes ask, “It is said that material happiness is temporary, whereas spiritual happiness is eternal. But even spiritual happiness seems temporary – sometimes we experience it and sometimes we don’t. When we face material temptations, it seems as if spiritual happiness has gone entirely away.”

Firstly, spiritual happiness is not temporary, though our present experience of spiritual happiness is temporary because our connection with the source of spiritual happiness – Krishna – is unsteady. The steadier that connection becomes, the longer our experience of spiritual happiness lasts. When the impurities that interrupt the connection are removed, we experience spiritual happiness uninterruptedly, in fact, eternally, for the source of spiritual happiness is eternal.

Secondly, spiritual happiness never goes away; even if we because of our past conditionings choose to pursue material pleasures, still the impressions of spiritual happiness never go away – they remain embedded deep in our consciousness and they make us look for something higher, something better, something deeper.

The Bhagavad-gita (06.44) declares that seekers feel helplessly attracted to transcendence due to the impressions from their previous lives. These impressions impel them to practice spiritual life and eventually attain spiritual perfection. While material impressions from past lives also attract and pull us in future lives, they don’t attract us to an eternal object, as do spiritual impressions. And further, they are connected with our outer shell – the body-mind mechanism – whereas spiritual impressions are connected with our soul, the essence of who we are. So whereas material impressions push us off the way to transcendence towards sense objects, spiritual impressions push us forward on the way.

By cherishing the spiritual impressions we already have and creating new impression by practicing devotional service and further by acting on our existing spiritual impressions, we can march towards supreme success on our spiritual journey.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita

The concentration-point is not the point of concentration by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita

The concentration-point refers to the thing on which we focus, whereas the point of concentration refers to the focus’s ultimate purpose.

The Bhagavad-gita, in its guidelines to yogi-seekers, recommends various concentration-points: for example, the space between the eyebrows (05.27) and the tip of the nose (06.13). Why does the Gita recommend different concentration-points? Because they are not the point of concentration – they are simply convenient starting points; bodily parts are readily available for everyone, even renunciates. Such initial concentration-points are meant for focusing our attention so that we can turn it inwards and take it on a spiritual quest that culminates in Krishna, who is the ultimate point of concentration (05.29, 06.14, 06.47).

Concentration is a means to an end, not an end in itself. To give an extreme example, porn-addicts may concentrate totally on a porn clip, but such concentration is degrading and undesirable

Unfortunately, aspiring yogis may get caught in the initial concentration-points, experimenting restlessly about which feels good. They try out, say, the vast sky overhead or a flowing stream in a scenic place or a shining candle in a dark room. They flit from one concentration-point to the next, choosing whichever makes them feel peaceful. By failing to move on to Krishna, they deprive themselves of the purification that makes concentration fruitful. Concentration is a means to an end, not an end in itself. To give an extreme example, porn-addicts may concentrate totally on a porn clip, but such concentration is degrading and undesirable.

Is peace the end of concentration? Yes, authentic concentration does provide peace, but as a byproduct, not the main product. Our peace is stolen by the impurities in our heart, which can be best purified by concentration on Krishna, the all-pure Absolute Truth. Other concentration-points don’t offer such purification. Though some of them may offer some pacification, even that decreases as their newness fades.

Rather than becoming yogi-consumers shopping for attention-catching concentration-points, we can focus on Krishna and achieve purity, peace, positivity and even liberation.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 06

Regulation is the road to realization by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 06

Some people ask, “Isn’t regulation deprivation? If we enjoy something, why should we check ourselves in doing it?”

The purpose of regulation is not deprivation, but facilitation of higher, spiritual enjoyment. When we don’t know that purpose and know only lower, material enjoyment, regulation seems like deprivation.

Gita wisdom helps remove our knowledge deficit. It explains that we are souls presently encased in material bodies. Because our body is ephemeral and peripheral to our core, material enjoyment is fleeting and unfulfilling. In contrast, spiritual happiness – happiness coming from the soul’s spiritual nature to love and serve the whole, Krishna, of which it is an eternal part – is eternal and eternally fulfilling. That’s why it’s intelligent to pursue spiritual happiness. Still, we can’t give up all materially enjoyable activities entirely – some of them such as eating are essential for survival. But these activities do need to be regulated so that we can have the mental space to pursue spiritual happiness.

If we are unregulated, we become obsessed with material pleasures, constantly fantasizing about getting newer, professedly better versions of those pleasures.

If we are unregulated, we become obsessed with material pleasures, constantly fantasizing about getting newer, professedly better versions of those pleasures. As this obsession consumes our mental space, we can’t even perceive spiritual happiness, leave alone pursue it. Consequently, we stay stuck in chasing material pleasures that despite their sheen of newness are essentially the same old stuff that has never granted us fulfillment.

Instead, if we choose to regulate ourselves, as theBhagavad-gita (06.17) recommends, we pave the road along which yoga practice can take our consciousness towards Krishna. That is, by being regulated, we can undistractedly practice yoga, experience for ourselves sublime spiritual fulfillment, contrast it with unfulfilling material enjoyment and thus realize the true natures of the two pleasures. Empowered by this realization, we can practice yoga with greater determination and march swiftly towards attaining the ecstasy of pure love for Krishna.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 06

Don’t give guidance alone – give confidence too by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 06

When we practice spiritual life for some time, younger practitioners may come to us for guidance in tackling problems such as the uncontrolled mind.

The mind is an ever-present problem that stymies seekers throughout history, as can be inferred from Arjuna’s raising this very problem in the Bhagavad-gita (06.33-34). Krishna’s response is instructive: he first agrees unreservedly that controlling the mind is a formidable challenge (06.35), then gently assures that the formidable is nonetheless possible by the right process (06.36). Such an initial acknowledgment by the mentor of the gravity of the mentee’s problem helps open the latter’s head and heart for subsequently receiving the solution.

Though getting timely reminders of basics can sometimes help practitioners, it can often irritate them when they are  stumbling in their struggles to apply those very basics.

The solution centers not so much on removing ignorance as on removing diffidence. The problem is not that practitioners don’t know what is to be done – the basic principles and practices are normally reiterated right from the beginning of spiritual life. Though getting timely reminders of basics can sometimes help practitioners, it can often irritate them when they are  stumbling in their struggles to apply those very basics. So when they are being overwhelmed by doubt and diffidence, they need urgently a boost of confidence: confidence that they can do it.

In the Gita, Krishna conclusively declares that the best process for mind control is bhakti-yoga, centered on cultivating his remembrance. And he also assures (18.58) that those who become conscious of him will cross over all obstacles by his grace. This assurance applies to the obstacle of the intractable mind too. Drawing on such assurances, we can share the confidence that Krishna will help us triumph in the battle for mind control if we just persevere in bhakti faithfully.

When we thus offer not just guidance but also confidence, our assistance has a greater chance of becoming transformational, as was Krishna’s assistance for Arjuna.

Chaitanya Charan Das

In today’s cultural imagination, yoga is often equated with physical postures meant for shaping and toughening the body. No doubt, practicing postures is better than ingesting chemicals for figure and fitness. Still, the postures alone are far from the equivalent of yoga.

Yoga refers etymologically and essentially to a process for attaining spiritual connectedness. Among the various such yogic processes, even if we restrict ourselves to the type of yoga that incorporates bodily postures – dhyana-yoga, still the postures are just one of its eight stages. As explained in Patanjali’s Yoga-sutras, these eight stages are: yama (don’ts), niyama (dos), asana (postures), pranayama (breath regulation), pratyahara (withdrawal of senses), dharana (concentration), dhyana(meditation) and samadhi (spiritual trance). Because yoga comprises these eight stages, it is often called ashtanga-yoga (eight-limbed yoga).

If we consider yoga’s nomenclature as a personification, then the contemporary fad of misappropriating just one of these stages is like lobotomizing yoga –cutting off seven of its limbs and reducing it to a handicapped ekanga-yoga (one-limbed yoga) that has little, if any, spiritual potency. Posture practitioners frequently pursue bhoga (bodily indulgence) and treat yogic postures as a tool for increasing bhoga. As such indulgences increase material attachments, the fragmented practice of bodily postures can grant neither liberation, nor spiritual fulfillment. Thus, those who lobotomize yoga lobotomize their own spiritual prospects.

The Bhagavad-gita illuminates these prospects. In its sixth chapter that deals with dhyana-yoga, it just (06.13) mentions yogic postures and immediately (06.14) dives into yoga’s heart, meditation on Krishna, who is the highest spiritual truth, the ultimate object of meditation, the granter of the supreme fulfillment.

If posture practitioners let the faith they have acquired by experiencing yoga’s material benefits prompt them to explore yoga’s spiritual side, Gita wisdom stands ready to help them attain yoga’s full blessing: the eternal ecstasy of spiritual love for Krishna.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 09.

Practice bhakti for experience, not expedience by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 09.

Those brought up or living in a devotional culture may go through the motions of bhakti for expedience’s sake, for example, to avoid reproach in their cultural circle.

At one level, their practice of bhakti, whatever the motivation, is good. It brings them in external contact with Krishna, say, by visiting his temple or chanting his names or going on pilgrimage. Such divine contact is auspicious, for it sows the seeds of bhakti in their heart. Thus, when compared to the millions living non-devotionally, expedient bhakti practitioners are definitely fortunate.

Still, their nominal external practice of bhakti doesn’t let them experience the fulfillment that comes through its wholehearted practice. The Bhagavad-gita (09.02) indicates that bhakti enables us to experientially verify higher spiritual truths. The highest truth is Krishna himself, the all-attractive Supreme Person, the reservoir of all pleasure. He makes his supreme sweetness accessible through bhakti. However, the hearts of nominal bhakti practitioners are usually caught in worldly attachments, so they can’t experience his sweetness.

If they devalue bhakti, their practice becomes reluctant and resentful, thus their hearts even more experientially bankrupt.

If their worldly attachments become obsessive, they may start seeing bhakti as a burden, a waste of time, an unwanted pandering to others’ emotional pressure. If they devalue bhakti thus, their practice becomes reluctant and resentful, thus their hearts even more experientially bankrupt. Their negative perceptions of bhakti comprise thick layers of impressions that further bury the bhakti seeds deeper.

Thankfully, those seeds are never lost – they can be unearthed and germinated by the spiritual stimuli coming from the association of devotees relishing bhakti. Such devotees may be advanced seers relishing bhakti’s elevated flavors or even new seekers quenching their thirst for transcendence through bhakti’s uplifting potency. Being intrigued by that taste, ritualistic practitioners feel prompted to retry bhakti with a heart ripe for experience. Reciprocating with their eagerness, bhakti makes its expedient practitioners experienced, enlivened and enriched.

The ego’s dissolution is not self-destruction, but the doorway to self-actualization

wrong about our core notions, we feel as if the core of us is dying with the death of our conceptions.

Our opposition to the refutation of our misconceptions frequently stems from our ego, the part of us that insists on its correctness. It is this part that when extended creates the fundamental misconception responsible for our mistaking ourselves to be material creatures, not spiritual beings.

The Gita (02.07) begins with Arjuna admitting that he was confused about his course of action – an ethical confusion that pointed to an existential crisis. For a reputed ruler, the admission of his confusion and delusion right in the middle of the battlefield in public view could well have been seen as a death of the ego, but his courage in doing so became the roadway to his self-actualization.

While resolving Arjuna’s crisis and confusion through its profound wisdom, Gita wisdom differentiates between false ego and true ego: false ego makes us hold on to false notions as the foundations of our self-identity, whereas true ego enables us to assimilate truths as progressions towards self-actualization.

The self is actually beyond destruction, being eternal and spiritual. So the false ego’s paranoia that being proven wrong is self-destruction is ontologically unfounded. Thus, by staying fixed in the pursuit of scriptural truth even when it counters our preconceived notions, we see the dissolution of the false ego as a demanding yet fulfilling roadway towards the restoration of the true ego in its ontic position as the substratum of our self-awareness as eternal parts of God, meant for eternal happiness in loving reciprocation with him, in an arena free from the delusions of the false ego.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 07

Doubts are not the problem – believing them is by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 07

Believing doubts might sound like an oxymoron because after all we think of doubts as something centered on disbelief.

Yet the truth is that belief underlies disbelief too, for even nonbelievers are believers – just that they are believers in their disbelief. Understanding that belief is not an option but a necessity can dramatically alter our attitude to belief as well as to its antipodal counterpart, doubt.

This brings us to another related point. Doubts in and of themselves are not the problem. They are natural states of mind resulting from our limitedness, from our need to live in a world far greater than our capacities to perceive, from our longing to know of truths far bigger than what are knowable by normal means.

Gita wisdom doesn’t ask us to simply reject doubt. It offers us a process by which we can know the truths that will raise our cognition to a level where experiential confirmation – purification, satisfaction, higher perception – can take us beyond doubts, just as getting cured of disease by a treatment experientially frees patients from their doubts. The Bhagavad-gita(07.01) informs us that if we hear and apply ourselves to the process of bhakti, we will become free from doubts, having been illumined by knowledge about Krishna.

Certainly, the very act of hearing about Krishna and following the process of bhakti requires dealing with some doubts, but rather than dismissing those doubts, we can just choose to disbelieve them. Such disbelief towards doubts Is not an act of blind faith – it is an act of mature, reflective open-mindedness that prevents our prejudices from taking our decision-making power away from us. After making its cogent case about the purpose of life and the process for fulfilling it, the Gita (18.63) concludes by calling not for faith but deliberation of its message.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 06

Expand your horizons in vision, but concentrate them in implementation by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 06

“Expand your horizons” is a popular saying among the ambitious. The Bhagavad-gita takes this saying to a higher level by expanding our horizons from the material level to the spiritual level – from temporary worldly pleasure to eternal transcendental fulfillment.

The Gita (06.20-23) outlines this fulfillment available in the state of spiritual perfection – a state where no tribulation can disturb us, a state where no temptation can allure us, a state where we ultimately become forever free from all misery. After delineating the destination, the Gita outlines the process. It (06.25: shanaih shanaih) urges us to move forward slowly, step-by-step, aiming to just take this one step right: keep the mind fixed on spiritual truth in the present moment.

If we focus on endeavoring to be devotionally engaged in the present moment, we can surely do it. And this doable thing all that we need to do

As is rightly said, a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. And we might add, it continues too with just a single step. If foot-travellers dwell on the prospect of walking a thousand miles, they may lose heart. But if they concentrate their horizons and focus on just taking one step – the present step – they can keep moving forward till they eventually reach their destination.

Similarly, if we think of the prospect of a lifetime of abstaining from selfish indulgence and a lifetime of striving for selfless devotion, we may lose heart. Instead, if we focus on endeavoring to be devotionally engaged in the present moment, we can surely do it. And this doable thing all that we need to do – live the present moment devotionally. Such devotionally lived moments will cumulate into a lifetime of devotion that will, by Krishna’s mercy, catapult us to him.

By thus expanding our horizons to take in the glory of our aspiration and concentrating them to take in the practicality of its actualization, we can move steadily towards destination Krishna.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 03

Don’t equate change of position with change of disposition by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 03

Many spiritual novices think that living in the world is the cause of entanglement and renouncing the world is the source of liberation. They sometimes even presume that if they just renounced the world, they would become liberated.

The Bhagavad-gita (03.04) categorically debunks such naïve equalization of renunciation with liberation. Liberation is essentially a state of disposition, wherein one’s heart is directed towards transcendental truth, ultimately Krishna, and is no longer captivated by the world’s promises of pleasure. In contrast, renunciation in the sense of joining the renounced order is nothing more than acquiring a new social position. No doubt, this social position can be favorable for cultivating a spiritual disposition. It provides a safe distance from most worldly entanglements and abundant facility for engaging in purifying spiritual practices.

The spiritually uncommitted join the renounced order to delight in its prestige and privilege – not to pursue purification.

Still, no social position can ensure a spiritual disposition, for the former is external, while the latter is internal. The external position is helpful only when it is used to purify oneself and cultivate a spiritual disposition. Otherwise, renunciation can be misappropriated as a subterfuge for evading social responsibility. Regrettably, the spiritually uncommitted join the renounced order to delight in its prestige and privilege – not to pursue purification. They even abuse the external to perpetuate the pretense of the internal, thereby reducing the renounced order to a breeding ground for hypocrisy (03.06).

For pursuing purification, the Gita consistently and conclusively recommends bhakti-yoga as the best process. Bhakti-yoga is so inclusive that it accommodates both social positions: householders and renunciates. Depending on our individual nature, background and realization, the social position most conducive for us will vary. By remembering the long-term goal of purification, we can resist the temptation to hop to another social position whenever our present position seems troublesome and instead focus on seeking Krishna’s ever-accessible shelter through diligent devotion.

Don’t just talk about the other – talk with the otherby Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 17

The other refers to any person whom we consider as distant from, even hostile to, us. Talking about the other means talking with various people about that person. Talking with the other means talking directly with that person to address our concerns.

All of us are distinct individuals with our own blind spots and sore spots. When we work together, often these spots rub against each other, creating friction that can degenerate into disruption. While we can’t avoid differences, we can avoid disruptions. Most relationships can be improved with clear communication, wherein proper clarifications are sought and got. Thereby, we understand each other’s sensitivities and take due care around them.

Most relationships can be improved with clear communication, wherein proper clarifications are sought and got.

However, such communication and clarification can’t take place if we talk with everyone except that person, as happens when we complain about that person to others. No doubt, we can talk with others in appropriate situation such as when they can act as mediators or can help us better understand the other person or can serve as confidential vents for the release of our inner emotional pressure cooker. But if such talking is done indiscreetly, it often makes things worse, not better. If that person comes to know about what we have spoken, they may think that we have been backbiting. Washing someone’s dirty linen in public certainly doesn’t endear us to that person. Though it may compel them to externally clean up their act, internally they may resent us, and that resentment will come out later in unexpected ugly forms.

Pertinently, the Bhagavad-gita (17.15) urges us to avoid talking in ways that agitate others. Backbiting, or even the perception of backbiting, is likely to agitate others. By choosing to sensitively talk with them instead of resentfully talk about them, we can contribute constrictively to healing the relationship.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 12

The spiritual may be unfamiliar but it’s not unnatural by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 12,

When we travel through an unfamiliar place, we often feel uncomfortable. Similarly, when we explore spirituality, we may feel uncomfortable because the concepts or customs may be unfamiliar, with the level of our discomfort depending on our background. Such discomfort may make us think, “All this spiritual stuff is unnatural for me.”

However, such thinking conflates the unfamiliar with the unnatural. The spiritual level of reality may be unfamiliar, but it is never unnatural, for the spiritual is the natural basis of all perception, including the perception that something is familiar or unfamiliar. Perception requires consciousness; so, matter being unconscious can’t be the source of perception. Gita wisdom explains that consciousness comes from the non-material spark of spirit within us, the soul, which is the actual person, the real me. The material body is our temporary outer covering and the material world is our temporary outer arena.

We will find bhakti experiences of Krishna so fulfilling, enriching and transforming that we will realize that Krishna consciousness is neither unnatural nor unfamiliar, but is our home territory.

Thus, it is matter that is foreign to us, not spirit. And even if presently the spiritual seems unfamiliar, we can familiarize ourselves with it intellectually and experientially: intellectually by studying Gita wisdom, and experientially by practicing yoga, especially bhakti-yoga. This yoga of love is a time-tested process that delivers experience of the highest spiritual reality: the all-attractive Supreme, the natural Lord of our heart, Krishna. Over time, we will find bhakti experiences of Krishna so fulfilling, enriching and transforming that we will realize that Krishna consciousness is neither unnatural nor unfamiliar, but is our home territory. Further, we will realize that thoughts disconnected from Krishna are foreign terrain – sooner or later, they leave us hankering or lamenting about external sources of pleasure.

By diligent bhakti practice, we will become so sheltered in Krishna that even if we are externally in unfamiliar situations, we will still feel at home internally (Bhagavad-gita 12.19: aniketah sthira-matir).

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 05

Fulfillment comes from neither oneness nor otherness, but sameness by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 05

Oneness is a buzzword among spiritual seekers – they often want to feel at one with the universe, with nature, with existence. As our lives are frequently agitated and fragmented, oneness sounds promisingly peaceful.

Yet oneness doesn’t provide lasting fulfillment because fulfillment comes not merely through the elimination of the negative (agitation and fragmentation), but primarily through the expression of the positive. And the most positive reality is love – to love and to be loved. Love, of course, requires an other, someone other than ourselves whom we can love.

While love requires the other, it also requires a commonality that can link the two. If the other is utterly different, then love becomes impossible – although the two needed for love exist, nothing exists to bring the two together. Thus love requires a balance of otherness and oneness.

If the other is utterly different, then love becomes impossible – although the two needed for love exist, nothing exists to bring the two together.

Gita wisdom indicates that this balance is found in sameness (saamya). Sameness refers to the reality that all living beings including the Supreme Being share the same spiritual nature – we all are eternal and we all share an eternal longing for love. Sameness doesn’t imply oneness because though we all are similar, we are not identical – each of us is a distinct, discrete individual. And this sameness principle applies to the human-divine relationship too. Though we are infinitesimal and God is infinite, still we can link with him for we share a similar heart that delights in love.

By the vision of sameness, the Gita indicates that not only can we see beyond externals such as caste, color or even species (05.18) but can also become liberated even while in this world of bondage (05.19). In its most evolved sense, the vision of sameness focuses our heart’s love on our supremely compatible Lord, thereby insulating it from the illusions that bind us to this world.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 12

Impersonalism philosophically perpetuates the padlock on the heart by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 12

Our heart naturally longs to move outwards in search of a worthy object of love. However, this search often ends in misery when those we love don’t live up to our hopes.

Being burnt by such distressing experiences, some people develop a fear for love. They put a padlock on their heart, not letting themselves emotionally touch or be touched by anyone. When they explore life’s spiritual side, they gravitate towards its depersonalized depictions. After all, if the Absolute Truth were an impersonal effulgence, and spiritual perfection meant dissolution of individual personal identity by merging into that effulgence, then there would remain no scope for love and the risk of pain thereof.

What our love needs is not a padlock, but a purificatory pathway.

Such fear-driven philosophization about spirituality may sound safe to some, but it’s actually life-denying. It perpetuates the padlock on the heart. What impersonalists think of as protection – suppression of our loving nature – ends up becoming restriction. Impersonalists sentence themselves to eternal emotional deprivation, feeling nothing, living largely like a stone. The longing for love lies at the core of our being – to deny it is to deny the very sentience that defines our existence. Impersonalism is thus self-chosen spiritual deprivation. Pertinently, Bhagavad-gita (12.05) cautions that obsession with impersonal conceptions makes the spiritual path troublesome.

Gita wisdom indicates that what our love needs is not a padlock, but a purificatory pathway. Spiritual perfection requires not the incarceration of love, but its redirection towards Krishna, the highest manifestation of the Absolute Truth. He is the transcendental personal source of the impersonal effulgence. We as souls are his eternal parts and are meant to delight with him in an eternal harmony of love. Our longing for love when reposed in him attains perfect and perennial fulfillment.

Why incarcerate the heart in perpetual lovelessness through impersonalism when bhakti can liberate it into eternal love?

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 09

Practice dharma for attaining spiritual purity, not material prosperity by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 09, Text 21

Most of the people who practice dharma, in the sense of doing some religious rituals, do so for getting material things. Some people extend this material mentality to the next life; they practice dharma for attaining material prosperity in heaven (Bhagavad-gita (02.42-43).

Practicing dharma for artha (material prosperity) is not unscriptural. To elevate materialistic people to the level of basic dharmic morality, the Vedas provide guidelines centered on trayi-dharma (the material conception of dharma comprised of three phases: dharma, artha and kama [sensory pleasure]). However, the Bhagavad-gita (09.21) warns that, though practitioners of trayi-dharma can attain heaven, they have to come down to earth when their pious credits get exhausted. They are like vacationers living in a hill-station resort who have to return to the grind of daily life once their savings run out.

Practitioners of trayi-dharma like vacationers living in a hill-station resort who have to return to the grind of daily life once their savings run out.

Significantly, material prosperity is not the ultimate purpose of the Vedas – their ultimate purpose is Krishna (Gita 15.15). Krishna is eternal, whereas material prosperity, be it in earth or in heaven, is ephemeral. We are at our core spiritual beings and we can find eternal fulfillment only in pure spiritual love for the all-attractive Supreme, Krishna. Attaining that love is the ultimate purpose of dharma. No doubt, our material needs are important and we shouldn’t neglect them. But nor should we elevate them to life’s – or dharma’s – only purpose.

To protect us from mistakenly practicing dharma for attaining the ephemeral instead of the eternal, the Gita contrasts the fate of materialistic dharma practitioners (09.21) with the eternal and imperishable attainment of devotees (09.20). Both before and after this comparison, the Gita indicates that bhakti is the eternal religion (09.02: dharmyam… avyayam; 12.20: dharmyaamrtam).

By practicing the dharma of bhakti and seeking spiritual purity, not material prosperity, we can gradually relish everlasting happiness in transcendental love for Krishna.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 02

Better to admit, “I am wrong” and be right than to insist, “I am right” and stay wrong by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 02

The Bhagavad-gita begins with Arjuna deciding to not fight in the upcoming war (01.46). Yet given the grave consequences of either decision – to fight or not – he soon had second thoughts and ended up confused (02.06).

Like Arjuna, we are all prone to commit mistakes in assessing situations. After all, we are limited creatures who have limited information about things and have limited intelligence to analyze whatever information we have. So we may arrive at mistaken positions, but that is not as problematic as making those positions a prestige issue. Because then we become goaded by the egoistic dogma, “It’s my opinion and I must be right,” and can’t look at the situation objectively. We either subconsciously neglect or consciously relegate things that problematize our position. When we are ego-driven, even if we somehow prove that our position is right, we end up winning the battle, but losing the war – our ego grows, but our wisdom doesn’t.

When we are ego-driven, even if we somehow prove that our position is right, we end up winning the battle, but losing the war – our ego grows, but our wisdom doesn’t.

Instead, we can see re-evaluating our positions as growth opportunities. By focusing on determining what is right, we grow in wisdom when we are wrong – and when we are right. If we are wrong, we learn what is right and why. And if we are right, we get a clearer, sounder, non-egoistic understanding of why we are right.

For seeking the truth non-egoistically, we can get inspiration from Arjuna’s example. He admitted to being confused and sought guidance from Krishna (02.07). That he submitted thus in public view between the two armies indicates that he was concerned not about looking intelligent, but about becoming intelligent. By keeping his priorities straight, he got enlightened and empowered with Gita wisdom (18.73).

By similarly putting enlightenment above the ego, we too can become empowered with wisdom.

Caste by birth is the perversion of class by worth by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita

The modern discriminatory caste system has been a source of great exploitation and misery. This regrettable state of affairs has resulted because some power-hungry people misappropriated an originally benevolent system of social and spiritual organization. That system, known as varnashrama, was meant for cooperation, not exploitation.

The Bhagavad-gita (04.13) states that varnashrama was based on qualities and activities, or in today’s parlance, attitudes and aptitudes. Recognizing that different people are good at different things, varnashrama provided them vocations that gelled with their specific set of strengths, thus enabling them to maximize their contributions to society and to their own well-being.

Is the positioning of the head at the top of the body and the legs at the bottom discriminatory? No, because it’s based on worth – on how these parts can make the most worthwhile contribution to the functioning of the body.

The division of labor in varnashrama was organic and symbiotic, akin to the division of labor among different bodily parts. Within the social body, brahmanas are like the head; kshatriyas, like the arms; vaishyas, like the belly; and shudras, like the legs. Is the positioning of the head at the top of the body and the legs at the bottom discriminatory? No, because it’s based on worth – on how these parts can make the most worthwhile contribution to the functioning of the body. Just as all bodily parts are valuable in their position, so too are all social classes in their position.

Unfortunately this cooperation-centered system was sabotaged by the caste by birth dogma, which was perpetuated by the power-hungry among the upper classes to establish their hegemony over the lower classes. Still, we don’t have to let the abuse of the system blind us to its use. Rather than castigating the whole system of varnashrama as evil, we can meditate on how its essential principle remains relevant and benevolent even today. Rather than chasing glamorized careers that don’t gel with our nature and leave us unfulfilled, we can choose vocations that channelize and maximize our worth.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 16

Ego is not the problem – false ego is by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 16

In normal parlance, ‘ego’ refers to arrogance and carries negative connotations. The Bhagavad-gita uses its Sanskrit equivalent, ahankara, in this sense (16.18), but also in another sense (07.04), to refer to the subtlest of all material elements, the instrument through which the soul misidentifies with the body.

More precisely, Gita commentators refer to this sense of identification as false ego to contrast it with the true sense of I-ness, which comes from the soul, the source of consciousness. The same Gita section that deems the ego to be ontologically real (07.04) also deems the soul to be real (07.05). It states that both the ego and the soul are Krishna’s energies – the ego is one of the eight elements that comprise his material energy and the soul is a part of his spiritual energy. The same Gita (15.07) later coveys unambiguously that the soul is eternally existent, being an eternal part of Krishna.

By rejecting wholesale the sense of I-ness, voidists leave themselves defenseless against the question: When we give up I-ness, who is it that will relish enlightenment?

That the soul is real and eternal implies that our sense of I-ness is real and eternal. So, to become enlightened, we don’t need to give up this sense of I-ness; we just need to shift its locus from the body to the soul. Some voidist or nihilist philosophers claim that our sense of I-ness is the cause of all our illusion and tribulation, so it needs to be dissolved. They throw away the baby with the bath water. By rejecting wholesale the sense of I-ness, they leave themselves defenseless against the question: When we give up I-ness, who is it that will relish enlightenment?

Only when we exist can we experience anything. Only when we exist as distinct persons can we love the Supreme Person, Krishna, and delight therein. By basing our sense of I-ness in the soul, we open the door to enlightened, eternal, ecstatic life.

Don’t confuse activity with productivity by Chaitanya Charan

Don’t confuse activity with productivity by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 14

We often have a heavy workload that makes us rush in a frenzy from one task to the next. Though we are active, working hard, our frenzied work is frequently unproductive.

Just as a fan that moves at a very high-speed, but gets nowhere, our mind whirls around in anxiety from one thing to the next without getting much done. In many cases, the mental overdrive can even lead to problems such as ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder). Even if that doesn’t happen, still the whirling mind can exhaust us. And even before we get mentally tired, our mental overdrive sabotages our ability to focus adequately so as to get things done properly. Due to the inattention, we often have to undo and redo things, thereby eroding further our time and energy resources. We are active, but we aren’t productive. Unfortunately, not realizing the difference between the two, we struggle to work harder, doing more activity, and get into greater anxiety, thereby further depleting our productivity.

Such mental overdrive characterizes the mode of passion, which, the Bhagavad-gita (14.12) indicates, impels us to insatiable desire and unceasing activity. The Gita contrasts passion with goodness (14.11), wherein our senses are illumined with knowledge, enabling us to do things effectively.

We can raise ourselves from passion to goodness by spiritual practices such as meditation. However, we feel that our resources are already strained to breaking point and beyond, and so we think that taking time out for spiritual activities such as meditation is an utterly unaffordable luxury. Yet the truth is that often we most need a break for meditation when we feel we have the least time for it. Why? Because meditation shifts the mode in which we function, thereby enabling us access the clarity of goodness and thus translate our activity into not anxiety, but productivity.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 15

Scripture makes our sight right by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 15

Our eyes are among our most used and most relied sources of perception. To make sense of things and make decisions, we want to see things and mold our actions accordingly.

Yet these same eyes on which we rely so much can mislead us, as is encapsulated in sayings such as “all that glitters is not gold” or in metaphors of animals killing themselves by pursuing mirages. What such sources of wisdom convey is not that we reject our visual perception, but that we complement it, indeed, root it in our intelligence. It is our intelligence that enables us to see right in the sense that our intelligence helps us come to the right understanding based on our perceptions.

This principle of using our intelligence to make our sight right applies all the more so the spiritual arena wherein we can see nothing – neither our own spiritual essence, the soul; nor the immanent spiritual essence of everything, God. And even our intelligence on its own can’t make much headway in comprehending these spiritual realities. To grasp them, we need to not only root our sight in our intelligence, but also root our intelligence in scripture.

When we study scripture diligently and internalize the worldview taught therein, we infer unhesitatingly from visible material realities to underlying spiritual realities. The Bhagavad-gita (15.11) asserts that the deluded can’t perceive the soul, neither its transcendent nature nor its imprisonment in material existence. But the same verse concludes that those with the eyes of knowledge can see the soul.

To help us perceive thus, scripture offers us not just intellectual comprehension through its philosophy but also spiritual realization through its delineation of the process of yoga. Diligent yoga practice activates our latent spiritual perception, thereby enabling us to perceive and delight in spirit, thus making our sight eminently right.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 11

Holding on to the Lord internally is more important than beholding him externally by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter11

Some people feel, “If I could see God, my faith would increase so much.” While beholding God externally can be special and thrilling, in our overall spiritual growth it is not necessarily the most important faith-boosting or life-defining experience, as we often imagine it to be.

The Mahabharata narrates how Duryodhana beheld Krishna, not just in his two-handed form, but also in his universal form. And yet that awe-inspiring mystical vision, one of the most astonishing theophanies in world history, didn’t change Duryodhana’s anti-devotional disposition. Though he was indubitably overpowered and momentarily overwhelmed by that sight, he soon downplayed it as just a show of magic that would be inconsequential when the actual war would occur.

Of course, we as devotee-seekers don’t have that kind of anti-devotional disposition. So, let’s consider the example of the devotee Arjuna in the Bhagavad-gita. In the Gita’s eleventh chapter, Arjuna gets to behold an even more awesome display: the universal form combined with a vision of the kala-rupa, God manifested as time.

Yet, Arjuna’s conviction and transformation are determined not after seeing this form, but even before seeing it. He acknowledges Krishna’s divinity in the tenth chapter and then requests the sight of the universal form to confirm for others’ sake through a visual revelation what he has understood through the preceding verbal revelation in the Gita. So the Gita’s narrative indicates that in the development of faith the sight of God is not primary, but supplementary, supplementary to the process of philosophical education that culminates in devotional conviction.

And even the eleventh chapter concludes not just with the glorification of the visual revelation, but with the injunction for inner dedication. The Gita (11.55) assures that those who hold Krishna within their heart will attain him and thereby behold him eternally.

Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 06

The mind makes us unthinkingly do the unthinkable by Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 06

The unthinkable refers to actions so bad, so shocking, so reprehensible that they are not even worth thinking, leave alone intending to do, and leave far alone actually doing. And yet the mind can make us do such unthinkable things.

How does it make us to do such things? By sweeping us away with its storm-like currents of desires. The Bhagavad-gita (06.34) points to this fearsome power of the mind by stating that it is as forceful and irresistible as a raging wind. When it carries us away, we act impulsively, recklessly, unthinkingly. Just as people caught in a storm don’t stop moving, but are moved in a direction different from where they wanted to go, similarly, under the mind’s spell, we don’t exactly stop thinking, but we think not according to our values and purposes, but in ways contrary to those values and purposes.

Areas where storms occur frequently build storm shelters, often underground. We too need to build inner shelters for protecting ourselves from the storms that are set off by the mind. These storms can be triggered either by the subconscious impressions that arise from within for no apparent cause or more frequently the conscious perceptions that rush into the mind from without.

Whatever way the storm is triggered, the important thing is that we find ways to protect ourselves. Whereas protection from physical storms requires physical motion from the pathway of the storm to the shelter, protection from emotional storms requires emotional motion from the source of the emotional turbulence to a source of emotional tranquility. The best such source is remembrance of Krishna, the eternally unchanging reality. The more we strengthen our emotional connection with Krishna through the practice of bhakti-yoga, the quicker we can avoid the mind’s storms, and stay purposeful and eventually become successful.