Video Information: Shastra Kaumudi, 20.12.2021, Rishikesh, India
Context:
~ Why an IITian loses focus - and what's the purpose of life?
~ Why there is so much suffering in life?
~ Do we suffer by our own choice?
~ How to avoid pain and suffering?
~ Is there a past life?
Music Credits: Milind Date
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Context:
~ Why an IITian loses focus - and what's the purpose of life?
~ Why there is so much suffering in life?
~ Do we suffer by our own choice?
~ How to avoid pain and suffering?
~ Is there a past life?
Music Credits: Milind Date
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Category
📚
LearningTranscript
00:00Good evening all. I would like to welcome everybody to this panel discussion on meditation, myths
00:14and truths, decoding Dhyan with Acharya Prashanthji. So I would take this opportunity to introduce
00:22our very special guest, an extraordinary person, Acharya Prashanthji. Acharya Prashanthji is
00:28a powerful voice of social-spiritual awakening in today's world. He is an acclaimed Vedanta
00:35exegete and author of over 70 books, including the national bestseller Karma. An alumnus
00:43of IIT Delhi, IIM Ahmedabad and a former civil services officer, he is an exponent of pure
00:51Vedantic wisdom, a vocal warrior against superstition and inner weaknesses, a promulgator
00:59of pure spiritual veganism and an expounder of essential human freedom. With whole heart,
01:07I welcome Acharyaji. So now I just request Professor Neeraj Kumkarna, who is a faculty
01:15mentor of Yogastha, IIT Bombay, to welcome Acharyaji with a few words.
01:23Good evening all of you. It's great to be present at a Yogastha event. Actually, I have
01:30after such a long time and I mean, these times are times of uncertainty. A lot of the students,
01:41they don't know what holds for them. Continuously we have, sometimes we have online classes,
01:46we had just resumed and we're getting back on track. And again, we are going back into
01:51the kind of this uncertainty mode. So in these, whenever there are fluctuations outside, frequent
02:02changes in rules, sudden changes in the rules, lockdown, no lockdown, our mind also is kind
02:09of in sync with those. It also moves up and down. And sometimes this uncertainty becomes
02:14unbearable. So what is the key here is, one of the keys that is here to get our lives
02:25back on track, irrespective of what is happening outside, is to get our mind on track. And
02:30this dhyana, which is going to be discussed in this program, is an important aspect and
02:35that is where it comes in. So we are grateful to you, Acharya ji, and welcome to Guide.
02:43And we look forward to an enlightening session from you. So by the way, I am Neeraj Kumbhakarna.
02:51I am a faculty member here in the Mechanical Engineering Department, and I am currently
02:56functioning as the faculty mentor for the Yogastha Student Yoga Club. So very grateful
03:01to you, Acharya, for your eminent presence and offering to guide us. Thank you very much.
03:07Namaskar, Acharya ji. I am Praveen. I am a PhD Bioscience student. And my question is
03:13regarding brain and mind. So is there a difference between mind and brain? There are case studies
03:24that we carry some memories from our past lives. So if that is true, then how and where
03:30our memories are stored? No, we do not carry any memories from our personal past lives.
03:45The memories that our bodies, our cells, our DNA carry is the collective memory of entire
03:57humankind, the entire journey of evolution. So it's not as if you, the one who is speaking
04:08to me right now, the one who identifies with his name, his body, his face, his age, his
04:15place of birth, his parents, that person does not have any particular past life. You
04:28have an infinite number of past lives. And that's not a linear thing. That's like
04:42a tree. That's like a large number of waves coalescing together and giving rise to several
04:56other small waves. None of the newly formed resultant waves can claim any of the previous
05:08and disappeared waves to be their past lives. Everything is coming from everything else.
05:22Individuality that we believe in is a myth. It is because the ego likes to be identified
05:31with this particular body, with this particular birth, that it seeks to project in the backward
05:42direction this particular birth and the consciousness related with it. Do you see what is going
05:51on? We do not live integrated lives. We are not identified with everything. Nobody can
05:58practically be. We all have strong identifications with this body, this body, with this face,
06:08with the memories that you carry currently in this brain. Because you are strongly identified
06:15with this, that's why you want to assume that this has had a particular personal history
06:25in the past. Now surely you do have a history, but that history is not particularly personal
06:33to you. What's your good name please? I am Praveen Kansal. So Praveen has had no past
06:47life in particular. There was nobody in the past, ever in the past, who died and took
06:59birth, rebirth as Praveen today. If you want to understand where you are coming from, then
07:08you have to understand that you are the resultant of millions of lives and deaths. Every single
07:17creature that has ever been on this planet has contributed to the one you are. So if
07:26you want to talk of your past lives, then your past lives are just too numerous, just
07:34too immeasurable. They are so immeasurable that they will not leave any scope for your
07:42particular individual ego to relish. The ego loves private property, no? We all want to say
07:53this thing is mine, this thing is mine, right? Whereas the thing with rebirth is that everything
08:03is yours. Equally everything belongs to everybody else as well. So this is not just yours, this
08:14belongs to everybody. Similarly there is nothing anywhere that is not yours. Everything belongs
08:21to everybody. Any person who ever lived is present in your being in some way or the other.
08:32Right? So that's where the brain is coming from. The brain is a product of a collective evolutionary
08:46journey. Then you ask why there are differences in people's brains, just as there are differences
08:57in people's colours and heights and genders. It's a random thing. A wave arises in the sea
09:10and every wave is a little different from every other wave. Do you want to assign a particular
09:18reason as to why a particular wave is the way it is? It is just the way it is. You could call it
09:24randomness. Or if you want to assign reasons, we said the reasons are so numerous, you will fail
09:33to list them. I suppose the query has not been fully answered because you also wanted to touch
09:46upon brain and mind, brain in context of mind. So what is it about the mind that you want to
09:53know, please? Sir, I want to know like brain is something which is very physical. Yes. Within my
10:05body. Yes. And it is said that mind is something which carries the thought. Mind carries thoughts,
10:14okay. And it has impression of different experiences that we have. Yes. Brain too
10:21has them. Yes. So I am not able to understand actually what is the difference between the two.
10:27Are these two words are two different entities, different things? You see, the mind is a concept.
10:41The brain is a fact. To begin with, this is the difference. The brain will exist irrespective of
10:57what you think about it, what you say about it. So the brain will exist irrespective of your
11:05station in life, the time of the day, the state of your consciousness, whether you are sleeping,
11:14whether you are agitated, whether you are comatose, whether you are fully attentive.
11:19The brain is just as this mug is. There are times when it will be hot, there are times when it will
11:29be cold, when it will be empty, when it will be full, clean, unclean, so many things. But it is,
11:35that's the brain. The mind is a concept. The mind exists in itself and the mind can come and go.
11:54The mind can be easily laid to rest and it can disappear. The brain won't disappear.
12:06Brain, you could say, in the human body is the physical seat of consciousness, which is the mind.
12:17But the mind is pretty much a flexible and liquid, fluid entity. It exists as long as
12:35there are impulses, thoughts, feelings. It exists only in activity, otherwise it is not there.
12:45The brain just is, like a piece of bread. The mind is associated with I. Whatever is
13:06happening in the mind has I at its center. This I, at some point one learns, is a bit of a fiction.
13:24Therefore, the mind really exists only as long as you want to believe in it
13:32and as long as you see some benefit in having it exist.
13:39In fact, the mind exists in a way it thinks its existence is beneficial to itself.
13:52That kind of flexibility the brain does not have.
13:56The brain cannot just suddenly change itself, though even the brain has a certain degree of
14:02elasticity and plasticity both and there are changes possible to it in the long run.
14:09But the mind is very, very fluid. It seeks information and then based on its need to protect
14:23on its need to protect itself, it takes new identities, new forms.
14:31A point may come where it realizes that there is no need for that kind of security,
14:37no need for identifications with this and that and then the mind just becomes still.
14:46That still mind you can also call as no mind. The mind is still, the brain will keep functioning
14:54as per its biological nature and the mind is just watching. The brain is working,
15:02the body is working, the world is in activity and the mind is a watcher. The mind no more
15:11needs activity, the mind no more needs movement or identification.
15:18So that's the difference between brain and mind.
15:23Just to add on to this, it means that the mind exists until there is I, there is ego within.
15:32Yeah, yes, yes. Mind is the very seat of consciousness. You cannot have anything
15:41mental going on in the usual sense without I being at its center. Even if you are thinking about
15:51some geopolitical event happening in Europe or West Asia, if you will investigate carefully,
15:58you will find that there is self-interest involved there. Your I is still present there,
16:06otherwise you wouldn't have been thinking about it. At least you would say I am interested in
16:12knowing about it and hence I am thinking about it or seeking information about it.
16:17So the very movement of the mind is self-centered, centered on I, centered on the ego.
16:29Namaskar Acharya ji. I am Shreyas Bohre and currently I am pursuing Masters in
16:35Technology and Development at IIT Bombay. Finally a student here. So my counter question is on the
16:42context of the statement that you say that mind is something which comes and goes. So there is a
16:50certain stimulus that creates or that leads to mind coming into action, is it? Yes, obviously.
17:00The mind is so very dependent on the surroundings and the stimuli.
17:08And then there are thoughts because of which we are able to perceive the mind, is it?
17:14Yes, you cannot know the mind if it is not in action. Thought is the action of the mind.
17:23So what is the state if we are devoid of any thought and so what is your or mine identity in
17:31that state and if one goes beyond saying that in order to get the state where mind is completely
17:41absent, so what would be the act of that person? I mean how does one go to achieve that state?
17:48You see, thought is both the lock and the key.
17:56Thought is just not the prison and its walls. Thought is also the way, the equipment
18:06you can get out of the prison. So it's a bit too early to talk of a thoughtless state.
18:19If you become thoughtless in your current state, your imprisonment within your dualistic prison
18:29will become permanent.
18:35So thought has to be used, at least initially, to understand what is going on because you see,
18:47who are we right now as we discuss all this? We are people who believe in our physical identities.
18:55We are people who live in a dualistic consciousness. I am talking to you.
19:02There are two. You are in front of a screen. There are so many others. All this is duality
19:08and we believe in this and we actually have no option but to believe in this. If we just say,
19:15oh I don't believe in this, that would be hypocrisy because we do. We do.
19:20We do. If I just go about saying, you know, I am not or aham brahmasmi,
19:28it would not only be untrue but actually dishonest.
19:36So because we live in this particular way, we have to use thought as a means to investigate
19:45what all this is about. Who are you? Who am I? What are these bondages? What is the world?
19:52What are temptations, desires, fears, all these things? Only then you come to a point where you
20:00can talk of dropping even the method that you needed for liberation because now you are already
20:08liberated. The method for liberation is thought itself. It would be not very wise to drop
20:21your weapons before the war is won.
20:25It's only after you have won the war that you find that the weapon is needless.
20:31Thought is a very important faculty available to you. But when you
20:42dive straight away into top class spiritual literature, you find a lot of reference to
20:50thoughtlessness, nirvichar state. That is obviously the ultimate state.
21:00But you cannot just wish or dream your way to that state.
21:07Given who you are and that is the fact of your existence, you have to work your way to that state
21:14and if you have to work your way to that state, thought is useful.
21:19So I would advise instead of asking what is the thoughtless state or how to drop thought,
21:25you have to first ask yourself, is your thought in the first place sharp enough?
21:32Exercise more thought, think deeply and the thing with deep and penetrating thought
21:42is that thought gets exhausted or fulfilled
21:48and then you get a glimpse of what you can call as thoughtlessness.
21:53Thoughtlessness therefore is not the absence of thought as such.
21:57Thoughtlessness is the fulfillment of thought.
22:02Thoughtlessness is when thought is not needed anymore.
22:07You cannot randomly drop thought. People attempt to do that.
22:13If you just randomly drop thought, you just become unthoughtful, unthinking.
22:23And that's not a very nice thing to say about someone that fellow behaves in unthinking ways.
22:37Think and think rightly. Think so sharply that the need for thought
22:47is brought down to zero at a point. There is nothing left to think.
22:58I have come upon something that is beyond thought. Thought has been stunned.
23:07Thought has worked so hard, it now wants to go to sleep.
23:10Thought has fulfilled its purpose.
23:17Right thought is needed. That is classically called as Atma Vichar or even just Vichar.
23:26If you go to Ramana Maharshi, he will just say Vichar is needed.
23:31You begin by asking, what is all this and to whom is all this?
23:37What is this and to whom is this? And if it is to me, what do I get by having it existent to me?
23:49Why must it exist for me at all? Surely I was stake somewhere
23:54in having it mean something to me, having it exist for me.
23:58And it's not easy to inquire this way. It requires a lot of attention. It requires hard work.
24:09It's a bit similar to solving a tough mathematical problem. In fact, tougher than that because
24:18here the inquiry is not about solving the problem. It's about solving the problem.
24:23It's a bit similar to solving a tough mathematical problem. In fact, tougher than that because here the inquiry is inwards and we are not accustomed to that.
24:33We have not had enough practice of that since our childhood.
24:37We know how to penetrate into things outside of us, but we have not been educated
24:45to look into our own minds and penetrate into our own intentions and desires
24:50and the entire inner structure.
24:54So, thought is very much needed.
24:57When thought has to sublimate, it will on its own. You don't have to plan for it.
25:06Be a sharp thinker. Be an inward thinker. Whenever you look at something, always think of the things relation to yourself.
25:17Nothing can exist for you if you don't have a stake in it. This sounds unbelievable to begin with, but I invite you to investigate it.
25:37So, Acharyaji, does stake in one way talk about attachment here?
25:42Of course, attachment and dependency.
25:45And that's how the mind exists, you know, in a false sense of duality.
25:52Mind is some kind of a half-I seeking its counterpart, its missing half, in a world that it projects on its own.
26:08The mind is seeking its own missing half. It's just that it's seeking at the wrong place.
26:18It's seeking there, in this, in that, in that, in that. And whatever the mind looks at, forms relationship with, it obviously has a stake in.
26:31There would be attachment, there would be fear, there would be greed, all the usual tendencies of the mind.
26:46Thank you. Thank you, Acharyaji.
26:48We have spoken about how brain is part of evolution. And at some point, mind came into the picture where it starts associating itself with I.
27:00And we also told that consciousness, mind, consciousness is seat of mind. And mind's tool or the thing that comes through mind is thought.
27:14And we also told that mind uses thought, to some extent to retain itself, to strengthen itself, to secure itself, things like that.
27:30And we are also telling that, use the same thought to help mind to resolve itself as well.
27:42And if we do that sharply, we might come to a state where mind don't retain itself.
27:52But looks like we are kind of fighting with the mind. Like mind wants to retain itself.
28:02But we are kind of, you know, we are kind of conflicting with it to help itself not to retain.
28:11The mind has an inner conflict. On the one hand, it wants to come to its end.
28:21On the other hand, it wants to exist to see its end.
28:29It wants to exist even in its end to enjoy the state after the end.
28:38That is just foolish. That is just unwise. So, the mind has to be counseled.
28:46The sheer impossibility of fulfilling paradoxical conditions has to be counseled to the mind.
28:58That's where, you know, thought also comes in the picture.
29:06You use thought, you use thought, you use thought a lot.
29:10And what I called as fulfillment of the thought is nothing but a revelation of inadequacy of thought.
29:22Thought exists by promising that it can bring your inner loneliness and your sense of hollowness to an end.
29:34It says you have problems within, I can solve your problems.
29:40Now that promise is never deeply fully tested by us.
29:47Because thought is making all these promises, the nice thing probably is to give thought a chance.
29:58All right, now that you are saying that you can solve my problems, proceed.
30:01Show me how you can solve my problems.
30:04And that's when you come to the limitations of thought.
30:10And after that, thought has nowhere to hide.
30:16It has to just raise its hands and surrender.
30:22And then that's a different way of being.
30:30A way of being in which you are not running after impossible promises.
30:37When you realize the fact of the body and the way it operates,
30:42and you look at it as you look sometimes without attachment at an animal,
30:56its ways, its maneuvers, its desires, it comes into existence, it dies.
31:08You know, I was looking at this short video.
31:12It was a series of short videos actually.
31:14And all these videos involved leopards and lions and tigers
31:22chasing wild beasts and deers and pigs and zebras, buffaloes, and hunting them down.
31:37And the whole process was quite, you know, graphic.
31:50The recording was very vivid.
31:53And I read the comments there.
31:54Nobody seemed to mind that the deer's life has been lost.
32:02Why? Because you realize it's a thing in prakriti.
32:06It happens.
32:09It happens.
32:12Yes, from where we look at it, it appears very gory.
32:19And you want to save the little animal being killed.
32:27Our sympathies are with the loser.
32:33But I found it noticeable that hardly any of the comments to those videos
32:45talked of pity or anger towards the predator.
32:54When you can look at your own life in the same way,
33:02that's when there is no need of self-defense or security.
33:10That's when one lives.
33:16That's when small, petty concerns do not matter that much.
33:27I don't know whether I have been communicative enough, but I just tried.
33:39Namaskar Acharyaji.
33:41Namaskar.
33:43As you said earlier, think up to the point when thoughts are going to stop or exhaust
33:50or their purpose is going to fulfill.
33:53But when we do a simple meditative state, then this is the most hard part.
33:59Like thoughts are, at that time, thoughts are never-ending situation.
34:06So, like, how to?
34:08No, no. Thoughts have already ended.
34:11Thoughts have already ended.
34:12They are just repeating themselves in a cycle.
34:17And that's when you should catch them.
34:20That's when you should know that your equipment is not serving you anymore.
34:27Thought is great as long as it's making some progress.
34:30But if the challenge is big and important enough, thought very soon succumbs.
34:42But thought, by its nature, is not very honest.
34:47It won't readily admit that it can't help you anymore.
34:52So, what does it do?
34:53It starts running about in circles.
34:58You think of A, and that leads to a thought about B, and that leads to a thought about C,
35:06and that leads to, again, a thought about A.
35:09And then again B, and again C, and then again A.
35:14Have you experienced this?
35:16This kind of cyclical thinking?
35:19When this starts happening, then it should be possible for you to just dismiss the whole movement of thought and say,
35:34No, no, no, you are not helping me anymore.
35:37What do you do with a taxi driver that's taking you around in circles?
35:48Does it help you?
35:52Or when you write a computer program and some fault in coding has resulted in a cyclical movement.
36:09Line 20 says, go to line 50.
36:13And line 50 in some way says, go to line 10.
36:19And the program is stuck in an endless iteration there.
36:28What do you do?
36:30You don't allow it to continue, right?
36:32You say, Sir, you are not serving any good purpose.
36:36So, please stop.
36:38Have some honesty.
36:43You exist to serve me.
36:47I don't exist to bear and tolerate you.
36:54You are my equipment.
36:55You are a means to an end.
36:58You are not the end itself.
37:00But that's the dishonesty of thought.
37:03It tells you it will take you to a particular end.
37:06And very shrewdly, very deceptively, it becomes itself the end.
37:22It keeps telling you, come, ride over me.
37:27I am taking you somewhere.
37:29As if the end is a place separate from thought, different from thought.
37:35But if you are sharp enough, you will realize that thought very soon becomes its own purpose, its own end.
37:48It wants to endlessly continue.
37:51The I-tendency that we have, on one hand, wants to come to an end, wants to sublimate, dissolve, become fulfilled, whatever you call it.
38:02On the other hand, it conspires against itself.
38:10In a superficial sense, it realizes that it must reach the destination and end.
38:18But somewhere it is so afraid or ignorant that it doesn't want to end.
38:26It wants to just endlessly continue.
38:29The process of counseling the ego-tendency or tricking it or educating it or working hard on it is the process of spirituality.
38:45That's what you call as working upon yourself.
38:49When you work upon yourself, you are essentially addressing your own inner dishonesties.
38:56You are asking yourself, why do I need to behave in self-defeating ways?
39:06Why do I need to believe in self-destructing concepts?
39:15Why do I need to be my own enemy?
39:18That's what is spiritual quest or inquiry or sadhana.