THE EIGHTFOLD PATH
1. Meditation on a Passage.
First comes the practice of meditation. You begin by devoting half an hour every morning as early as convenient to the practice of meditation. Do not increase this half-hour period, but if you want to meditate more, have half an hour in the evening also.
Have a room in your home for meditation, or a special corner, and keep it as austere as possible. A quiet, cool, well-ventilated room is best. Have pictures of the great spiritual teachers if this appeals to you.
If you want to sit in a straight-back chair, one with arms is best; or sit cross-legged on the carpet. Sit with spinal column erect, and eyes gently closed. As concentration deepens you may begin to relax and fall asleep; if so, draw yourself up and move away from your back support so that you can keep the spine, neck, and head in a straight line.
Have an inspirational passage memorized, such as the Prayer of St. Francis of Assisi, the second or twelfth chapter of the Bhagavad Gita, the Twenty-third Psalm, the first chapter of the Dhammapada of the Buddha, the Beatitudes of the Sermon on the Mount, or a selection from the Upanishads. Go through the words of the passage in your mind as slowly as you can, letting each word drop singly into your consciousness. Do not follow any association of ideas, but keep to the words of the inspirational passage. When distractions come, do not resist them, but try to give more and more attention to the words of the prayer. If you find that your mind has wandered away completely, go back to the first word of the prayer and begin again. Keep adding to your repertoire of inspirational passages from the scriptures of all religions to prevent dryness in meditation.
The secret of meditation is that you become what you meditate on. When you use the second chapter of the Gita in meditation, you are driving the words deeper and deeper into your consciousness, so that one day, perhaps after many years, they will become an integral part of your consciousness.
2. Repetition of a Mantram.
Japam is the silent repetition of the mantram, or Holy Name, in the mind.
The popular etymology of the Sanskrit word mantram is from manas, ‘mind,’ and tri, ‘to cross over’: “that which enables us to cross the tempestuous sea of the mind.” Every religion has its mantram. The very name of Jesus is a mantram; so is Hail Mary, which calls on the Divine Mother whose children we all are. Om mani padme hum is a great Buddhist mantram; mani means ‘jewel’ – the Self – and padme, ‘the lotus of the heart.’ Jews may use the Shema or Barukh attah Adonai, ‘Blessed art thou, O Lord’; Muslims repeat the name of Allah or Bismillah ir-Rahman ir-Rahim, ‘In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate.’ And one of the oldest, simplest mantrams in India is Rama, from the root ram, ‘to rejoice,’ signifying the source of all joy.
When you are angry, afraid, or anxious, repeat the mantram to still the agitation rising in your mind. Anger and fear are power rising within us, and by the repetition of the Holy Name we can put anger and fear to work, harnessing them for the benefit of ourselves and others rather than allowing them to use us destructively.
At bedtime, repeat the mantram in your mind until you fall asleep. In the morning you will feel refreshed in body and mind.
Whenever you get a moment, while waiting for a bus or while walking, use this time to repeat the mantram. Boredom is a great source of problems to people who do not know what to do with their time. We may smoke, for example, just because we do not know what to do with the odds and ends of time in our day.
The mind is very much like the restless trunk of an elephant. In India elephants often walk in religious processions which wind through the streets of the town on their way to the temple. The trunk of the elephant is a restless thing, always moving, and as the temple elephant is taken through the narrow streets of the bazaar, it is usually tempted by the coconuts, bananas, and other produce displayed in the stalls on either side. As it walks, if the shopkeeper doesn’t watch, it picks up a coconut and puts it in its mouth. There is a loud crack, and that is the last of the coconut. Then from the next stall it takes a whole bunch of bananas. It doesn’t peel them, but just puts the whole bunch inside, and it’s gone. But the wise mahout, the man in charge of the elephants, knows their habits, so as the procession begins he gives the elephant a short bamboo stick to hold in its trunk. The elephant holds the bamboo firmly and walks through the streets without confiscating anyone’s property.
This is what we do when we repeat the mantram: we slowly give a mantram-stick to the mind, and instead of wanting to smoke or overeat, it has something to hold on to. Gradually, this makes the mind firm, secure, steadfast, and proof against tension.
3. Slowing Down.
Millions in our modern world suffer because they are constantly pushed and hurried. Hurry makes us tense and causes us to make mistakes and do a poor job. The remedy for hurrying is to get up earlier, so that we can begin the day without tension and set a slow, leisurely pace for the day. When we are concentrated and slow we do not make mistakes; we do a much better job, which in the long run is much more economical than hurrying and making mistakes. In order to slow down we may need to eliminate some unnecessary activities from our day.
4. One-Pointed Attention.
The practice of meditation is a systematic exercise in concentration, which will finally become a permanent, spontaneous state. It is a great aid to meditation if you practice being one-pointed during your day. Give your complete attention to whatever you are doing; particularly in conversation, give your complete attention to the person with whom you are talking. After much practice, you should be able to make your mind one-pointed, concentrating on whatever task is at hand.
Almost all of us suffer from a mind which is many-pointed, and we are usually not able to bring all our concentration to bear on a given problem or task. For example, background music while eating, while studying, while working, prevents us from being fully aware of what we are eating, studying, or working at. Eating while watching a movie curtails our capacity to appreciate the movie, because the mind is two-pointed. When we do only one thing at a time, we are healing the divisions in our consciousness, and when we can give our complete attention to another person, he cannot help but respond by giving his complete attention to us.
5. Training the Senses.
This does not mean sense-negation or sense-denial but training the senses to be obedient servants. We begin to train the senses by exercising discriminating restraint in our choice of movies, television programs, books, and magazines, and by eating nourishing food in temperate quantities rather than things that appeal to our taste but have no nutritional value. It is good to have a light meal in the evening and our heaviest meal at breakfast and to eat plenty of fresh vegetables and fruits. Avoid overcooked, deep-fried, strongly flavored, and heavily spiced foods.
The training of the senses takes a long time, but finally it will enable us to have mastery over our deepest drives, our strongest powers. When the senses are trained, the body becomes healthy, strong, and beautiful.
6. Putting Others First.
When we go after our own pleasure and profit, dwelling on ourselves and ignoring the needs of those around us, we are constricting our consciousness and stunting our growth. People who are driven by anger, for example, are usually those who are full of self-will, who cannot put the other person first. Seldom do they have lasting relationships; seldom are they able to live at peace with themselves and with those around them. But the person who has little or no self-will is secure and by his calmness and steadfastness is able to help those who are agitated to become calm. In the home it is particularly the privilege of the woman by her personal example to help the members of her family to be patient, enduring, and forgiving. I place so much emphasis on the family context because it gives us countless opportunities every day for expanding our consciousness by reducing our self-will or separateness. This need not mean following the wishes of the other person always, but when it seems necessary to differ, this must be done tenderly and witho
ut the slightest trace of resentment or retaliation.
7. Spiritual Fellowship.
It is of great importance for all of us to draw inspiration from someone who is able to interpret the sacred scriptures and the great mystics in the light of his own personal experience. It is a difficult task to practice meditation for many years, day in and day out, and we all need the support and companionship of people meditating together. This is the great advantage of a spiritual community, or ashram, where those dedicated to the practice of meditation live together with a spiritual teacher. In your own home, it is very good if members of the family can meditate together.
8. Spiritual Reading.
My suggestion here is to read the scriptures and great mystics of all religions. If you want to know about the mystical tradition, go direct to the great mystics, rather than relying on books about mysticism. This devotional reading can be an inspiration and encouragement on the spiritual path, but even here it is better to read a few books slowly and well than many books quickly. All knowledge is within, and the practice of meditation enables us to draw upon this knowledge. Through carefully selected spiritual reading we can be inspired by the spiritual awareness of the mystics of all religions and ages.
If we want to make the discovery that will fulfill all our desires and establish us in abiding joy, bringing to our life limitless love, wisdom, and beauty, then the mystics have described the path for us to follow. By following these simple rules of right living and practicing meditation regularly, we can learn to fulfill the supreme goal of life, which is to discover experientially that all life is one.
CHAPTER ONE
The War Within
DHRITARASHTRA
1. O Sanjaya, tell me what happened at Kurukshetra, on the field of dharma, where my family and the Pandavas gathered to fight.
“The Gita,” says Mahatma Gandhi, “is not a historical discourse. A physical illustration is often needed to drive home a spiritual truth. It is the description not of war between cousins, but between two natures in us – the Good and the Evil.” Volumes have been written about the battle which is said to have taken place on the field of Kurukshetra, located north of Delhi, but for the spiritual aspirant, the battle described in the Bhagavad Gita is not limited to a particular historical setting. Sri Krishna’s message is as valid today as it was centuries ago, and it will continue to be so tomorrow, for it describes the eternal truth of life that the fiercest battle we must wage is against all that is selfish, self-willed, and separate in us. Today when the world is being torn asunder by war, when violence stalks our streets and invades our homes, when anger disrupts our relationships and separateness pervades our consciousness, Sri Krishna’s immortal words, given to us in the Gita, are of urgent practical value. The violence we see about us is a reflection of the anger and self-will burning deep within us. Most of us carry a conflagration around with us in the depths of our consciousness, and many of us are skilled tacticians in guerilla warfare right in our own homes. The war the mystics of all the world's great religions talk about is not the one erupting in the Middle East or in Southeast Asia that makes newspaper headlines; it is the one erupting from the fierce self-will afflicting all of us, estranging individuals, families, communities, races, and nations.
Once I was on a train going from Delhi to Simla, high on the Himalayas, and on the way we passed through Kurukshetra, the historical battlefield of the Bhagavad Gita. My fellow passengers were talking about the tremendous battle which took place there, and when we arrived at the scene, they eagerly climbed out to have a look. To me there was no need to disembark, because I already had an inkling that the real battlefield in the Gita was right inside each passenger on the train. The language of battle is often found in the scriptures, for it conveys the strenuous, long, drawn-out campaign we must wage to free ourselves from the tyranny of the ego, the cause of all our suffering and sorrow. By setting before us the inspiring ideal of the victorious man or woman as one who has conquered himself or herself, the mystics urge us on to fight this battle and eradicate all that is selfish in us.
How can we ordinary men and women, living in the midst of our family and society, achieve such a victory? In the Gita Sri Krishna gives us the precious jewel of spiritual wisdom, of immediate practical value to everyone’s life. He tells us how we can learn to fight the battle against self-will and separateness through the practice of meditation and its allied disciplines, and he shows us how in our own daily lives we can gain the will and the wisdom to transform anger into compassion, fear into courage, and greed into tireless striving for the welfare of others.
SANJAYA
2. Having surveyed the forces of the Pandavas arrayed for battle, Duryodhana, the prince, approached his teacher and spoke.
3. “O my teacher, look at this mighty army of the Pandavas; it has been assembled by your gifted disciple, the son of Drupada.
4–6. “There are heroic warriors and great archers who are the equals of Bhima and Arjuna: Yuyudhana, the mighty Virata, Drupada, Dhrishtaketu, Cekitana, the valiant king of Kashi, Purujit, Kuntibhoja, the great leader Shaibya, the powerful Yudhamanyu, the valiant Uttamaujas, the son of Subhadra, and the sons of Draupadi; all these command mighty chariots.
7–8. “You who are the best of the brahmins, listen to the names of those who are distinguished among us: Bhishma, Karna, and the victorious Kripa; Ashvatthama, Vikarna, and the son of Somadatta.
9. “There are many others, too, heroes giving up their lives for my sake. They are all proficient in war and armed with a variety of weapons.
10. “Our army is unlimited and commanded by Bhishma; theirs is small and commanded by Bhima.
11. “Let everyone take his proper place and stand firm supporting Bhishma.”
Religion is realization of the unity of life; this is the supreme purpose for which we have come into the human context. Our intellectual orientation, useful though it is in helping us solve some of our problems, tends to make us forget that the scriptures of the great religions are meant to be personally experienced in daily life. I appreciate the scholarly editions of the Gita, the Bible, or the Dhammapada that abound in footnotes and appendices, but I always ask myself: will this approach show me how to translate the teachings of Sri Krishna, Jesus the Christ, or the Compassionate Buddha into my own life? Will it prepare me to undertake the long, exhausting war I have come into this world to win?
Sri Krishna insists we do the actual fighting in this battle ourselves, but with his infinite mercy, he outlines the battle plan and gives us the maps, weapons, and strategies necessary to win. The first tip the Gita gives us is on the nature of the contesting armies, the Kauravas and the Pandavas. The Kauravas are usually identified with the forces of darkness that bring about death and despair, and the Pandavas with the forces of light which bring abiding joy and unshakable security. The ancient Sanskrit scriptures throw a flood of light on this dichotomy by describing it as a choice between preya and shreya. Preya, the passing pleasure that seems pleasing to the senses but soon fades into its opposite, is what we choose when we indulge in injurious physical habits or retaliate against others. Shreya, the good that leads to lasting welfare for the whole, is what we choose by cultivating healthy habits, by bringing conflicting parties together, and by putting the happiness of those around us first. These two conflicting forces are very much in evidence in the world today: on the one hand we have made great strides towards eliminating poverty and disease, but on the other hand, we have stockpiled sufficient arms to kill every man, woman, and child on the face of the earth several times over. We seek peace and freedom for all, but we are letting the selfish pursuit of personal profit and pleasure destroy our families, our communities, and even our society. As Sri Ramakrishna, the great saint who lived in India in the last century, was fond of saying, “If you want to go east, don’t walk towards the west.” Such is the confusion of our lives that we have forgotten there is this choice to be made at all, and in fact we no longer know whether we are run
ning east or west.
Another set of beautiful Sanskrit terms for describing the perennial opposition between the forces that elevate us and those that bring about our downfall is nitya and anitya. Nitya refers to that which is eternal and unchanging, and this is what we seek by forgiving those who harm us and supporting those who differ from us. Anitya is that which fades away and brings suffering in its wake, and this is what we seek when we give in to an angry impulse or do what leads to self-aggrandizement at the expense of our family, community, and society. When we fight others, whether physically or in the mind, we harm them and ourselves, but when we fight all that is base and self-willed in us, we bring lasting joy to everyone. This is a central theme in all the great scriptures. We can all learn to conquer hatred through love by drawing on the power released through the practice of meditation to throw all our weight, all our energy, and all our will on the side of what is patient, forgiving, and selfless in ourselves and others.
12. Then the powerful Bhishma, the grandsire, oldest of all the Kurus, in order to cheer Duryodhana, roared like a lion and blew his conch horn.
13. And after Bhishma there was a tremendous noise of conch and cowhorns and pounding on drums.
14. Then Sri Krishna and Arjuna, who were standing in a mighty chariot yoked with white horses, blew their divine conchs.
In this greatest of all battles between the forces of good and evil, Arjuna represents you and me, and Sri Krishna, the Lord of Love enshrined in the heart of every creature, is his best friend, his dearest companion, and above all, his beloved teacher and guide. Sri Krishna is not someone outside us, swinging between Neptune and Uranus; he is closer to us than our body, nearer to us, as the Sufi mystics put it, than our jugular vein. The word Krishna comes from the Sanskrit root krish, ‘to draw’; Krishna is the one inside us who is drawing us to himself all the time. The title Sri means ‘Lord.’ Sri Krishna is eternal and omnipresent; he is our real Self. Whether we call him the Christ, the Buddha, or Allah, he is the supreme Reality underlying consciousness and uniting all creation.
The End of Sorrow Page 2
