Saturday, July 17, 2010

Reactions are ours – we can transcend them

To a friend who is going through a process of courtship and finds that response of her fiancée sometimes is not palatable

As beauty, love and ananda is the nature of the Self – the quality of life energy within; memory, thinking process, ego (idea of one being distinct from others), desires, anger, agitation, attachment (moha), possessiveness, greed, fear, guilt etc. and consequent experience of suffering are the attributes of mind.

We mistake moha (attachment) for love and pleasure for ananda and believe as if one can feel love and ananda through the mind. Because of this misunderstanding, many a person tries to purify the mind by avoiding negative feelings towards others and inculcate feelings of love, compassion etc. towards everyone. Many a religious texts also exhort the people to do so. But no one (except a seeker) ever succeeds in such purification. The reason is that love and compassion are not the attributes of mind – these are qualities of our Self – beyond the reach of the mind. As one cannot see through the ears – ears are not a faculty for that; peace, love and ananda cannot be experienced through the mind.

In a lighter vein, regarding nature of mind, I am reminded of an oft repeated dialogue of Prem Chopra in a film – "Bhains jab poonch oothayegi to gobar hi karegi, gana nahin gayegee" (when a buffalo lifts its tail, it will deliver only dung, not a song) – this is its nature.

Anything planned and done through mind (by a person who has not realised his Self) will be powered by its attributes and will bring about suffering and misery to him and others. One can give others only that which one has. This is the reason why efforts of all good intentioned social workers and revolutionaries [Jai Prakash Narayan (one can see what is left behind in Bihar after his work for Samagra Kranti), Gandhiji (his experiment with ahimsa could not prevent one of the greatest bloodshed of all the times at the time of partition), Communists (the workers are worst sufferers in the countries ruled by them), Naxalites etc.] do not bring about intended social change.

The limitation of mind is also illustrated by the life of Dale Carnegie, the author of most widely read books in the world (Stop worrying and start living, How to win friends and influence people) whose wife deserted him (could not win her) and he committed suicide (being unable to stop worrying). All his teachings, appreciated by millions around the world, could not even help him what to talk of others.

One has, therefore, to work for transcending the mind – efforts to refine it may give one temporary illusion of relief from suffering but such efforts are bound to ultimately fail.

Before we come to the ways of transcending the mind, some more understanding about the functioning of mind would help our journey on inner exploration with conviction.

Now for instance, some vibrations originating from someone’s throat are carried through the air to the ear drums of a person. These vibrations are converted into impulses and carried by some mechanism to the mind. The mind interprets these impulses and a response or reaction is generated. If something is said by a stranger to some other stranger, we may not even take note of it. But if the same thing is said by a person with whom we feel connected to or by a stranger directed at us, there is a response or reaction. The response or reaction will again vary depending on whether one likes or dislikes a person who uttered the words and one’s mood at that time. Thus for the same external stimulus (words or vibration) our responses or reactions vary.

Similarly two persons in similar situations react differently. It is for this reason that a person is considered a cool guy whereas another is considered as hot tempered in the same organisation. If the reaction was shaped by external circumstances, they could not have differed much in a given set up. But as we all know, it is not so. A person is shy, another is full of anxiety and fear and yet another is very bold and aggressive.

The reason is that response or reaction is solely ours. Anger or hatred cannot be triggered in a Buddha or a Christ because it is not there. Lust cannot be triggered in a small child through pornography or any other means as it is not there. External circumstances merely bring to the fore what is lying hidden inside us. They, at best, trigger an existing dormant emotion in us and cannot create it.

It is something like – children are playing in a park with fire crackers, unaware of two containers with attached leads, one packed with explosive material and another filled with water. Both the leads catch fire but only first container explodes. To stop the children from playing in the park is neither a solution nor it is desirable (though ignorant moral brigades try to do even these things). One has to remove the explosive material from the container. The triggers and inputs from the persons and situations around are too many and to control and manage them is beyond one's capacity. One cannot and need not change every person and thing around according to one's perception. In fact, one cannot endow oneself with a right to change somebody else – every person is as much an independent being as one is. The only workable solution found down the ages is – just empty the container and enjoy the play.

Thus, if one is miserable it is because of the reaction produced in one’s mind to an external situation or to a bad memory or some apprehension for the future and not because of an external situation as such. If mind stops churning bad memories of the past or apprehensions of the future, our true nature – ananda – is revealed to us.

The secret thus lies in stopping the mind from visiting the past and travelling into the future. Mind is ours. Reactions are ours. So we have the capability of doing away with our reactions. And this is the most beautiful aspect of life that we are not dependent on anybody or anything for doing away with our reactions and thus attain a state of joy in our lives. It is solely in our hands. We can do it.

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