The End of Sorrow

by Eknath Easwaran

  We all can begin this discipline in many little ways in our daily life, particularly between parents and children, and husband and wife. We can fill the hours with freshness by putting the other person first. Whenever, for example, we go to a restaurant, it is good for the wife to give the menu to her husband and ask him to choose for her, or for the husband to ask the wife. In the early days the going may be hard, but if we can repeat the mantram and persist, we will find that gradually each person will be thinking only of what pleases the other. This exercise in the reduction of self-will can be done in all the little matters of daily life – hairstyle, books, movies, attitudes, and even opinions. I am very much in the prehistoric tradition. I have been charged with living five thousand years in the past, and I wouldn’t disagree with this because, after all, my life is entirely based on the spiritual values proclaimed by the illumined sages of ancient India and the great mystics of the world. These values are timeless. They were completely valid five thousand years ago; they are completely valid today; and they will be completely valid five thousand years hence. Whatever unites people permanently is spiritual and heals individuals, families, and society. On the fundamental issues of life, a man and woman cannot help but see alike if they realize the unity underlying life. This is not losing one’s personality but gaining it. All of us need to work towards realizing this unity in all our relationships.

  The person who has gone beyond likes and dislikes, Sri Ramakrishna will say, is like an autumn leaf floating in the wind. It floats gently here when the wind blows here, it goes there when the wind blows there, and slowly it settles to the ground. On most occasions we can be pliable and ready to bend without any disloyalty to our ideals. People who will easily bend our way under normal circumstances can stand like a rock when a great crisis comes. Sometimes good things come to us, sometimes bad. We can learn from both; we have enough resources to meet any challenge that comes. This awareness does not denude life of joy, but enables us to accept the joy that comes, and also to face the sorrow that comes, with equanimity and resourcefulness.

  66. The disunited mind is far from wise; how can it meditate? How be at peace? When you know no peace, how can you know joy?

  Here there is no mention of religion, or of the spiritual life, or of God; Sri Krishna simply asks Arjuna what intelligence anyone has who is not united within. To bring this into a modern context, try to imagine an automobile whose four wheels want to go off in four different directions. This is actually what is happening to you and me. The senses are always running out towards stimulation; the mind runs out in the direction of agitation; the intellect goes in the direction of argumentation; and the Atman just sits there watching and says, “We cannot do anything with this car. These people shouldn’t be given their driver’s license, and this particular car should be recalled.” Meditation and the disciplines recommended by the great mystics of all religions are for putting the four wheels of our car back on the same road.

  Na ‘sti buddhir ayuktasya na ca yuktasya bhavana: “If you are not united inside, with all your desires flowing towards one goal, you cannot get access to your deeper creative faculties.” This is practical language. If you want to be a great painter, you do not try to be a sculptor, a financier, and a linguistic expert, saying, “Well, painting is one of the many things I am going to do.” If you are going to paint, you paint. Then the Lord continues, Na ca ‘bhavayatah shantir: “If there is no harmony inside, if there is no unity inside, how can you have peace?” This is something all of us can understand. If we are restless inside, if there is a war going on inside, wherever we go, no matter what abundance we live in, we will never be able to know security. Then, Ashantasya kutah sukham: “When you have no peace in your heart, how can you know joy?” The purpose of meditation and spiritual disciplines is to lead us to joy. It is understandable if we are rather skeptical about this in the earlier stages. We may even be unable to associate joy with meditation. “Getting up early morning when it is more joyful to sleep? Eating less when it is more joyful to eat more? And putting other people first? Have you heard of a more ridiculous idea of joy?” These are not unnatural questions for us to ask. We may feel the discipline dull and dreary in the early years of our sadhana, but the goal of meditation is complete, abiding joy, releasing the great capacities for service which lie untouched in all of us.

  Bhakti yoga, the path of devotion or selfless love, is the very best way for ordinary people like ourselves to move towards the total unification of consciousness that is the climax of meditation. People often ask me how to deepen the vein of devotion that is in all of us, and I reply that by unifying our desires and undergoing the disciplines of meditation, we can all become devoted to the Lord and aware of his presence in everyone around us.

  The other day we saw a movie filmed on the Himalayas, and in one scene a group of pilgrims was crossing a deep ravine on a rope bridge. While on the bridge, which is swinging like a pendulum, everyone is saying Rama, Rama, Rama, Rama with as much devotion as he can muster. But as soon as the first step is taken on terra firma, it is likely to be kama, kama, kama, kama. When there is trouble and turmoil we are very responsive to the mantram; but as soon as the current turns, when our health is good, income is steady, and pleasures are all flowing smoothly, we forget the Lord.

  When trouble and turmoil come, let us remember that it is the Lord’s way of saying, “Don’t forget Me.” Let us be grateful when God sends us joy, because we all need joy. But let us also be grateful when he sends us sorrow – physical ailments, mental distress, financial breakdown – because these can enable us to turn inwards to remember him.

  Sri Ramakrishna was fond of saying that our love of God should be as great as the love of a miser for his gold, the love of a mother for her child, and the love of a lover for the beloved, all combined. That is the kind of bhakti we should try to cultivate. Most of us have our infinite capacity for love dissipated into innumerable little channels, but we can all develop single-minded, concentrated devotion by putting the welfare of those around us first. Devotion in any relationship helps to unify consciousness, and in the modern world, people who find it too difficult to accept a divine incarnation with complete love and loyalty can all cultivate devotion, or selfless love, in personal relationships.

  Many of us may not find it easy to choose a personal incarnation to whom we can surrender our entire devotion. My suggestion to such people is to let the personal incarnation choose them. Instead of shopping around the pantheon of incarnations, why not just say, “We are at your feet. We are pretty bad, and we are going to be an encumbrance. Now will someone who has mercy, and who doesn’t mind having a stone around his neck, pick me up?” There are great mystics who say in complete self-surrender, “Will somebody please pick me up?” and that is all there is to it. Because they have so completely unified their love for the Lord, their travail is over within an instant. The Lord comes to them immediately.

  In our repetition of the mantram, we are asking the Lord to come and help us out because we cannot lift ourselves up by ourselves. For those who have this simple faith, the time may come when they will receive an indication that the Lord is coming to say, “You are mine.” This is grace. And when the Lord puts his mark on us, every samskara picks up its bag and leaves. This experience of grace is not unlikely to come to most of us who are steadfast in their meditation and who, even though they have occasional lapses, are doing the very best they can.

  67. When you let your mind heed the Siren call of the senses, they will carry away your better judgment as storms drive a boat off its safe-charted course to certain doom.

  68. Use all your power to set the senses free from attachment and aversion alike, and live in the full wisdom of the Self.

  These two verses are a comment upon the fate our modern civilization faces if we do not correct the sensate philosophy on which it seems to be operating at present. Anyone who tries to follow the seductive call of the senses, which promise satisfaction, security, and fulfil
lment, is likely to meet with disaster. The Lord therefore tells us to train our senses, to turn them from turbulent masters into obedient servants. Without this period of discriminating sense restraint, all of us risk the danger of rebellion and continuous riots inside.

  These two verses are of direct application every day, from morning when we go to the breakfast table until night when we finish the midnight snack. There is a close connection between letting the palate have its way and letting the mind have its way; Gandhi says that the control of the palate is a valuable aid to the control of the mind. Today the mass media subject us to so many skillful advertisements which tickle the palate that even the most vigilant among us may find themselves falling into their trap. We must consistently retrain the palate by giving the body nourishing, temperate food, rather than responding to the advertiser’s slogans, which try to make us eat things that are undesirable and unnourishing. Even during the past ten years there has been an increase in concern about good nutrition. More and more dieticians and doctors are telling us how necessary it is to restrain the palate in order to be physically healthy. There is likely to be a certain initial resistance by the senses, which are used to being pampered, but we can all change our food habits gradually to anything that we approve of. Here each person is at liberty to do a certain amount of experimentation. We need not be too harsh, nor should we be too lenient, in changing our food habits. The changeover, for example, from nonvegetarian to vegetarian food can be made gradually. In most textbooks on nutrition we find statements about what foods to avoid and what foods to rely on, and often the ones to be avoided are nonvegetarian, especially in the case of heart disease. Even if they do not advocate it consistently, nutritionists seem to be slowly coming to the conclusion that the vegetarian diet is good for physical as well as mental well-being.

  Vegetarianism not only helps us to maintain our health on the optimum level but also has the spiritual purpose of deepening our awareness of the unity of life. I am fortunate in being born in a Hindu family that has been vegetarian probably for over a thousand years, but I am not a vegetarian because my ancestors were; I am a vegetarian because I have come to know that I form one unity with everything around me. As our spiritual awareness deepens, we will come to have great compassion for animals and will never want to be a party to their ill-treatment. Vegetarianism affirms the unity of all life.

  69. Such a sage awakes to light in the night of all creatures. That which the world calls day is the night of ignorance to the wise.

  What is night to the vast majority of human beings is day to the illumined man; and what we call day is night to the mystic. The world of our ego is the world of sense data, and as long as we identify ourselves with the body, we move in the sense-world of samsara, that which is moving all the time. As long as we live in the field of the senses, as long as we live in the sea of flux, none of us can escape change, which culminates in the great change called death.

  As our meditation deepens, our view of even the external world will change considerably. I do not see the world today as I used to see it twenty years ago. I do not see people as I saw them twenty years ago. Everything changes in an almost miraculous fashion. Where we looked upon someone as a threat to us, we come to regard him as a friend; we begin to see the unity underlying all life. This change comes on so gradually that we are not even aware of it unless we stop to compare how we saw life a few years ago with how we see it today.

  Most of us see life not as it is, but as we are. We look at life through our own needs and prejudices, and the ultimate narrowing of vision occurs when we look at everything as pertaining to ourself. Most people look at life through a very narrow ego-slit. We should never say we see life as it is, and never denounce the world as evil and tempestuous, because we are looking at it through one tiny slit. If we could ask Sri Ramana Maharshi or Sri Ramakrishna what they see in the world, we would be heartened to hear them say they see it whole. They do see the turbulence and violence, but for them the world is a hospital where we are all being treated and made whole. Ramana Maharshi, with his dry humor, said that the body is the biggest disease of all; and Sri Ramakrishna told his disciples that no one can be discharged from the hospital without being fully cured. The Buddha also, in the Four Noble Truths, declares that in the world we are all suffering from the same devastating disease, tanha, the fierce thirst of selfish desire, and to cure this disease he gave us the regimen of the Eightfold Path.

  All we need learn in life is to forget ourselves little by little by not dwelling upon the dullest, dreariest subject on earth, “I.” In order to widen the ego-slit, we put first the welfare of those with whom we live as good friends or family, and realize the unity of life in that circle. Someone once asked me if it is possible to realize the unity of all life just by putting first a few people with whom he lived. I answered, “If you want to be the tennis champion of the world, do you go and play against every tennis player in the world? You just go to the central court at Wimbledon and beat the few there, and when you get the cup, you have become champion.” Even in a small circle of good friends, if we can consistently try to put their welfare first, this will enable us to widen the slit until finally there is no slit at all, and we see the whole panorama. This is what nirvana means: removing the constriction that makes me see only what conduces to my own profit and pleasure, until I see all life as it is, as one.

  70. As the rivers flow into the ocean, but cannot make the vast ocean overflow, so flow the magic streams of the sense-world into the sea of peace that is the sage.

  The first word is apuryamanam, ‘ever full.’ This is your nature and mine. Our idea, born of ignorance, that we will become full if we can make a lot of money or enjoy a little pleasure is absurd, because we are already full. Our account is full; we cannot add to it, nor can we take away from it. Within ourselves we have the biggest bank in the cosmos, but instead of going in to claim our legitimate account, we go to little banks asking for petty loans. As long as we live on the egocentric level, we will never suspect what fullness and security lie within ourselves. We will always have an emptiness inside that only Self-realization can take away.

  The Compassionate Buddha tells his disciples that the egocentric life consists of duhkha. On one level, the word duhkha means ‘sorrow.’ As long as we live as separate fragments in a world of separate fragments, clashing against one another, we cannot but suffer. There is also another connotation to the word: duh means ‘bad’; kha means ‘hole.’ The Buddha says there is a fathomless hole running through our consciousness. To fill this emptiness inside, we keep running to bring pail after pail of dollars and pour them in; but at the end of the day it is still duhkha, the fathomless hole. We pour in money, material possessions, pleasure, power, prestige, and it all goes down the fathomless drain. Once we begin to realize that nothing can fill this chasm, we will understand St. Augustine’s cry: “Lord, how can I ever find rest anywhere else when I am made to rest in thee?” Sri Krishna tells Arjuna, “Why waste your life going after things that pass away? You do not need them. You are already full because I am living in the depths of your consciousness. You have only to look within to realize Me.”

  The second word is achalapratishtham, ‘established in motionlessness.’ This is the complete stillness of Brahman, the complete motionlessness of the supreme Reality. In order to be established in the changeless, immutable Reality called God, we have to still the turbulent mind completely. If you want to see what your mind is like, go stand on a high parapet overlooking a rocky seacoast when there is a storm. The only creatures who enjoy this maelstrom are the sea lions. They float along with the waves, and when a giant one comes, they all jump up to ride on it with joy. But being made in the image of the Lord, and having been brought into the human context, our glory is to play in the sea that is still. The mind is often compared in Sanskrit to the sea, ever moving, ever rolling, ever restless; but even though there are turbulent waves on the surface, in the depths of our consciousness is the divine sti
llness which, through the grace of the Lord, we enter as our meditation deepens. Ten years ago, when I used to talk about the still mind and transcendental wisdom, people would sometimes object: “But we are men of reason. Ours is an age of reason.” I agree that if we could act as men of reason, there would be a good deal of satisfaction in it, but our mind is not used to rational thinking. Very few people have the capacity to concentrate completely on a given topic. In the morning, when you are brushing your teeth, try to keep your mind on the toothbrush for just two minutes; you will find the mind jumping about from one topic to another, all irrelevant, and each more disconnected than the last. Most of our tension, frustration, conflict, fatigue, and lack of will are due to the continuous working of the mind. And in people who are self-centered and capable of resentments, this constant, undisciplined activity of the mind can lead to a terrible drain on energy. When we have a resentment, prana, or vital energy, is leaking out all the time, even in our dreams. This is why some people may get up in the morning after eight hours of sleep saying, “Why is it I am so tired?” In order to stop this continuous draining of vital energy that demoralizes and debilitates us, we have to learn to keep the mind still.

  Meditation in the early stages is a discipline to slow down the mind, which is now traveling at breakneck speed, weaving from lane to lane and observing no signals, no regulations. If you are practicing meditation sincerely, systematically, and with sustained enthusiasm, there will be certain times when the mind becomes concentrated. Just for ten minutes there may be complete concentration on the second chapter of the Gita, and you feel as if you are getting control over a very powerful car. You are on U.S. 101, there is very little traffic, and you are able to travel fifty-four miles per hour without even turning the wheel or stepping on the brakes. Everything is under control. You go down one lane only; there are no turns, no merging traffic.When you can concentrate on one thought, there is no tension because there is no division; there is complete security because there is complete concentration. On the other hand, most of us are like the drivers we see in San Francisco during the Christmas rush. You have only to look at the tension on their faces to see how much effort is required; they seem to be trying to lift the car and throw it forward. This is what we are doing in life – taking all our weight upon ourselves and trying to push ourselves forward, when the Lord is behind us saying, “Why don’t you let Me do it? I have many arms.”