Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 15

Defiance of God dooms us to dependence on matterby Chaitanya Charan Das Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 15

Some people openly defy God and claim, “I am independent – I will do whatever I want and enjoy whichever way I choose to.”

While such an attitude is often lauded in today’s liberty-loving culture, not many people recognize that it actually curbs our liberty. When we reject God, we end up embracing a material conception of life, wherein we rely on our material body and material objects for enjoyment. As long as we identify ourselves with our body, we may not realize how dependent such an existence is. But when infection or injury reminds us of the body’s brittleness, we may wonder whether there is anything more to life beyond the body.

While misery and mortality are sobering pointers towards a trans-bodily dimension of life, a much more positive pointer is spiritual experience, especially the enriching experience of Krishna that can be had by the practice of bhakti-yoga. Once we taste such non-material happiness, we can look at our embodied existence with greater clarity and envision for ourselves a higher life not shackled by bodily weaknesses.

Indeed, once we start relishing spiritual happiness by devoting ourselves to Krishna, we realize that a life disconnected from him is actually a life of dependence, degradation and at times even depravity. The body offers meager pleasure, but when we know of no other pleasure, we crave and slave more and more for it, thus getting ripped away from our values. TheBhagavad-gita (15.07) aptly indicates that those who do not harmonize with Krishna struggle and suffer due to the mind and the senses.

The more we accept that we are Krishna’s parts and that we need to love and serve him to be happy, the more we become enriched by higher happiness and the more we break free from our dependence on matter.