The End of Sorrow

by Eknath Easwaran

  And other fell on good ground, and did yield fruit that sprang up and increased; and brought forth, some thirty, and some sixty, and some an hundred. There is sometimes a suspicion that the spiritual life is rather selfish. In the early days, when we try to make meditation the basis of our life and retire from some of our former activities and former cronies, it is not unlikely that we will be branded as unsociable. On such occasions we can strengthen ourselves by remembering that the practice of meditation is not going to benefit us alone. We may not be able to reach thousands, as does a great mystic like Sri Ramakrishna; but each of us, as our spiritual awareness deepens, can help a few members of our family and a few friends to find their center of gravity within.

  30. The Self of all beings, living within the body, is eternal and cannot be harmed. Therefore, you should not grieve.

  In my village, where death was not uncommon, most people on their death bed would send for my Grandmother just to have her sit by their side. They would hold her hand or look into her eyes, which said, “There is no death.” For her, the dissolution of the body was not death at all. At the time of samadhi, this is the realization the lover of God attains. When he becomes united with the Lord in his heart, he goes beyond identification with the body. The physical nexus is cut once and for all, and afterwards, though he looks after the body very carefully, he knows that it is just an instrument to be used to convey the truth of immortality to all those ready to receive it.

  The body is not me; it is only the jacket which I wear. When this jacket is torn and tattered, the time has come for me to throw it away and put on a new jacket. Sri Krishna asks, “What is there to grieve about? What is so tragic about putting on a new jacket? Do you want to keep an old jacket that lets in cold air, makes you uncomfortable, and can no longer be used to serve others?”

  When you are able to go deep into meditation and rise above physical consciousness, it will seem as though you can just take off the body as you would take off a jacket and leave it on the hanger until you finish meditating. If sometime in meditation you go very deep into your consciousness, after going home you may even find that you have left your jacket at the ashram. Mystics in India have been victims of this divine phenomenon at the most inopportune times. Once, while walking on the streets of Calcutta, Sri Ramakrishna heard a song about the Divine Mother, or saw someone seated in meditation with eyes closed, and had such a sudden transformation of consciousness that he dropped his dhoti. The dhoti is wrapped very gently around the hips. It is not meant for sudden attacks of higher states of consciousness; it is meant for the secular way of life. I can imagine Ramakrishna’s embarrassed disciples gathering around him and asking, “Blessed One, where is your dhoti?” and he, in sublime simplicity, answering, “You ask me where is my dhoti? I ask you where is my body!”

  Body consciousness is the obstacle to divine awareness, and every day we must ask ourselves what is likely to decrease our identification with the body. Whatever increases physical consciousness cannot be an aid to the spiritual life. Overeating, for example, intensifies body consciousness. Every time we are tempted to eat something because of an advertisement or an old samskara, we should ask ourselves if the body needs it or if it will merely stimulate the palate. Once we start retraining our sense of taste, which is in the mind, we can enjoy green salad and fruits as the greatest of delicacies. Skipping a meal, especially when we have eaten a little more than is necessary at the previous meal, is another way of lessening body consciousness. Other aids for lessening physical consciousness are giving up harmful habits such as smoking, drinking, the use of drugs, and overindulgence of any kind. The Gita does not ask you to do this for puritanical reasons; it says that if you want to rise above physical consciousness, these are the things you have to throw away. Once this obsessive physical identification has been broken through, you feel so good, so high, all the time that you cannot imagine using any artificial aid to be a few inches high when you are now almost the height of the cosmos.

  31. Considering your dharma, you should not vacillate. For a warrior there is nothing higher than a war against evil.

  32. O Arjuna, the warrior who is confronted with such a war should be pleased, for it has come of itself as an open gate to heaven.

  33. But if you do not participate in this battle against evil, you will be violating your dharma and your honor, and you will incur sin.

  34. The story of your dishonor will be repeated by people endlessly; and for a man of honor, dishonor is worse than death.

  35. These brave charioteers will think you have withdrawn from battle out of fear; those who formerly esteemed you will treat you with disrespect.

  36. Your enemies will ridicule your strength and say things that should not be said. What could be more painful than this?

  37. Death means the attainment of heaven; conquest means the enjoyment of the earth. Therefore rise up, Kaunteya, with the resolution to fight.

  Now Sri Krishna begins giving specific instruction to Arjuna, a very practical man who is a little impatient with all the philosophical touches the Lord has been adding. He looks ready for the supreme teaching, and Lord Krishna, who knows when the time is right, plunges into the great verse:

  38. Having made yourself alike in pain and pleasure, profit and loss, victory and defeat, engage in this great war and you will be freed from sin.

  Tato yuddhaya yujyasva. Yuddhaya means ‘for battle,’ for the great war. We are all born to fight the ego, to do battle against the three phalanxes of the ego’s formidable army: fear, which is the infantry; anger, which is the cavalry; and lust, most powerful of all, which is the elephantry. The language of the Gita is really appropriate when it describes this as a long, drawn-out war. If we talk in terms of one life, then all our life this war will rage; if we talk in terms of a million lives, against the background of evolution, this war has been going on all the time. The war is between what is selfish in me and what is selfless in me: what is impure in me pitted against what is pure in me, and what is imperfect against what is perfect.

  Sukhaduhkhe same kritva. Here is the way to embark upon this war against all that is death in yourself so that you may have immortal life. Sukha is pleasure; duhkha is pain. Make yourself alike in pleasure and pain. Here is one of the central themes of the Bhagavad Gita. Even if you fight with all your might, the ego will always win, you will always die again, the cycle of birth and death will go on and on, unless you succeed in being alike in pain and pleasure. When I used to hear this from my Grandmother, I would always make the same practical objection: “I don’t know how to do this. I like pleasure, and I don’t like pain.” In answer, her smile seemed to say, “How original of you!” This is everybody’s problem; it is the human condition to be pleased by pleasure, and to be displeased by pain. This is why Sri Krishna says, Sukhaduhkhe same kritva: transform your mental state into perfect equanimity if you do not want to die. When you get the firm resolve not to die, when there is no price you are not prepared to pay in order to transcend death, then you have the unfailing motivation for carrying out this great discipline of being alike in pleasure and pain.

  When pleasant things happen to us, the mind immediately gets agitated, and we say, “I am pleased; I am happy.” We wrongly identify ourselves with this passing wave of mental agitation called pleasure, and because we identify with the wave of pleasure, we cannot help identifying with the passing wave of pain also. When something is a little more pleasant, the mind gets a little more agitated and becomes excited. If we repeatedly get caught up in the same experiences of pleasure and excitement, they become samskaras; the mind becomes more turbulent, and we get caught more and more in the cycle of birth and death.

  Suppose someone praises us, “Look at your hair: gleaming like molten gold. Look at your eyes: Mediterranean blue. Look at your lips: ruby from the mines of Golconda.” When somebody praises our appearance, almost all of us respond in the same way; immediately our mind becomes agitated. The point Sri Krishna makes is not that w
e have to tell people, “Don’t praise me; I am trying to make my mind calm.” What Sri Krishna says is to be grateful if someone declares that you are irresistible, but do not depend for your security on that; do not allow your mind to be affected. The way to remain calm when good things are happening to you, when people are praising you, is to repeat the mantram. As soon as someone looks appreciatively at your appearance, start repeating Rama, Rama, Rama. I know it is dampening, but as long as you are vulnerable to praise, you will be vulnerable to condemnation also.

  Most of us do not realize how much we depend upon other people’s approval for our security. The time may come on the spiritual path, as it came many times in the life of Gandhi, when people withdraw their appreciation and their support because we are not going the way they want us to go. When we are established within ourselves, criticism, even condemnation, will not shake our security, will not make us hostile. We can function beautifully alone, against the whole world if necessary. If criticism is destructive, we can ignore it; when it is constructive, we can benefit from it.

  More than once the people of India refused to follow Gandhi, particularly in the early days. “You are an ascetic,” they said. “You are a dreamer; you are impractical. We cannot follow you.” Gandhi would always answer, in effect, “I am not asking you to follow me. If you want me, my terms are complete nonviolence. If you are not prepared for that, look for another leader.” Many times he said this, and many times the people of India said, “All right, we are going to look for another leader.” But after some days they would return to him. This is what faith in oneself means: if necessary, I will go alone. What do I want when I know the Lord is within me? Whose criticism am I afraid to face?

  The Lord continues to emphasize the duality of life in the word labhalabhau, ‘profit and loss.’ Today you may get fifty percent on your investment; tomorrow you may lose fifty percent. Be alike in gain and loss, not only in terms of money, but in terms of time, energy, and effort. Personal profit agitates the mind and gets you selfishly involved. “How much is it going to bring me? If it brings me fifty percent it is a philanthropic enterprise. If it brings me loss it is not good business.” Even though you may have a high code of personal conduct, the mental agitation continues when you are attached to profit. In whatever you are doing, says Sri Krishna, keep your equanimity. He uses one more word, jayajayau, ‘victory and defeat.’ Make your mind alike in victory and defeat, in gain and in loss, in pain and in pleasure; then you will go beyond death to the supreme state.

  39. You have heard the intellectual explanation of sankhya, O Partha. Now listen to the principles of yoga; by practicing these you can break through the bonds of karma.

  Arjuna is an intelligent man who has been taught by the best teachers in ancient India, and Sri Krishna therefore tries to satisfy his intellectual needs to some extent. This kind of intellectual background to the spiritual life is called sankhya, which literally means ‘counting’ or ‘listing.’ First the spiritual teacher lists carefully the benefits of meditation and spiritual disciplines; but listening to these theories is not enough. The disciple must begin their practice. The theory is called sankhya; the actual practice is yoga. The word yoga often has been misunderstood, especially in the West, as the practice of certain physical exercises. These exercises are not yoga; they are asanas. Neither is music or dancing yoga. There may be musicians in India who say their music is yoga, but it is not. There may be dancers who claim their dancing is yoga, but I am afraid it is not. Yoga is the practice of meditation and the allied spiritual disciplines. When the senses are stilled, when the mind is stilled, when the intellect is stilled, when the ego is stilled, then the state of perfect yoga is reached.

  Arjuna, having accepted Sri Krishna as his teacher and listened carefully to his initial instruction, is now ready to hear in detail about the actual practice of spiritual disciplines.

  In this verse the Lord promises Arjuna that if he practices these disciplines – bases his life on meditation, repeats the Holy Name, restrains his senses intelligently, and puts the welfare of all those around him first – then he shall go beyond the law of karma. The law of karma is not a concept limited to only the Hindu and Buddhist traditions; no one has stated this law in clearer terms than Jesus the Christ: As ye sow, so shall ye reap. If we contribute to the suffering of those around us, we cannot escape the law which will bring this suffering back to us. Similarly, if we begin to keep the welfare of others in view, and contribute to it every day, we are contributing to our own joy as well.

  In the ultimate analysis, our resentments and hostilities are not against others. They are against our own alienation from our native state, which is cosmic consciousness, Krishna-consciousness, or Christ-consciousness. All the time we are being nudged by some latent force within us. Somebody is trying to remind us what our native state is, and all the time we are under this pressure from within. Our senses are turned outwards, and we are adepts at personal profit and pleasure, so we do not like to hear these little reminders; but the needling goes on. When we get tense, it is easiest to vent our frustration by making cracks at our children, our wife, or our husband – it is just a matter of geographic proximity. When we attack other people, when we become a source of trouble to others, it is not because we want to add to their trouble; we have just become an object of trouble to ourselves. Our nerves are tense; we cannot sleep properly; we cannot sit down and meditate. Our partner is close by, our parents are close by, our neighbor is next door, so why not go and get them agitated? We succeed in agitating seven people, and each of them is now prepared to agitate seven more. Agitation, particularly the form that follows the precept “Express your anger; explode your anger on society,” is infectious, and this chain of retribution will eventually bring our agitation back to us. When we are agitated, when we are ready to burst our anger upon others, the immediate solution is to go for a long walk repeating the mantram.

  40. On this path effort never goes to waste, and there is no failure. Even a little effort toward spiritual awareness will yield protection from the greatest fear.

  For me this is one of the most memorable verses in the Gita, and it will take a lifetime on the spiritual path to appreciate its applicability to every aspect of human life. When we meditate on the Lord within for even a short time every day, this effort is not wasted. Even if we meditate only thirty minutes every morning, and try to practice the allied spiritual disciplines to a small extent during the day, this can go a long way in guarding us against many fears, known and unknown, which lurk in our consciousness. Most of us have fears of losing what we believe gives us security. Those who go after money are doing so under the impression that this is the way to become secure. They are the victim, the toy, of the stock exchange. There are others who are afraid of losing their youth. Beauty has nothing to do with age. We can be beautiful in childhood, in youth, and in old age to the extent we are unselfish. To be secure, we must find the source of security within ourselves. The advice given by Sri Krishna in the Gita is simple and profound: if times are bad today, try to contribute the best you can to the welfare of those around you. If times are good today, also try to contribute the best you can to the welfare of those around you. You can serve others no matter if times are good or bad. This is the choice we make in order to find security within ourselves.

  41. Those who follow this path, Arjuna, who resolve deep within themselves to seek Me alone, attain singleness of purpose. For those who lack resolution, the decisions of life are many-branched and endless.

  Sri Krishna says to look at the life of the man of the world, whose mind is many-pointed, like a grasshopper jumping from one blade of grass to another. Every day he keeps making decisions, most of them wrong. This is the natural pattern of worldly life when we go after personal pleasure, profit, prestige, and power. In comparison, in the spiritual life only one major decision is necessary. If, after turning to meditation, we look back upon our past, upon the innumerable wrong decisions we have made in se
eking fulfillment in the world without, going down one blind alley after another, and contrast this with our present development, where everything is being subordinated to reaching the supreme goal, we see that now our consciousness is slowly being unified.

  We are all granted a reasonable margin in life to make our experimentation with personal pleasure, but one day we must begin to suspect that it is not going to fulfill our deepest need, which is for Self-realization. When we begin to have this suspicion, when it is already at work deep inside, we may still resist it for a while. We are all ego-centered, and it is only natural that when our old props are being taken away we fear that we are going to lose out. None of us need have any qualms if now and then a little voice whispers, “See what you are missing.” Even after taking to meditation we are likely to have a few reservations. We may have a secret hope that in one of the rooms in our consciousness some old cravings can find an occasional welcome – we can leave the key under a stone, and they can just slip in; we do not have to invite them, but if they come we need not be inhospitable. In other words, we are all human.

  In order to find the freedom of being able to function everywhere, under both hostile and favorable circumstances, to be able to reach the goal of Self-realization, we have to make the decision to find the Lord, and to subordinate everything else to union with him. If we can make this decision to base our life on meditation, to repeat the mantram as often as we can, to restrain the senses vigilantly, and to put the welfare of those around us first, the Gita says we need have no doubts about the outcome. We need not be anxious about the results; this is the Lord’s responsibility. Self-realization comes through the grace of the Lord, who is ever present within.

  42–43. There are ignorant people who speak flowery words and take delight in the letter of the law, saying that there is nothing else, O Partha: whose hearts are filled with selfish desires, whose idea of heaven is their own enjoyment, and who engage in myriad activities for the attainment of pleasure and power. The fruit of their actions is continual rebirth.