Part 3: Bhagavad Gita, Commentary by THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM - Chapter 15 - No Questions only Doubts!🔗

doing what they must do. I cannot take a single step on my own. My limbs move in accordance with Her wishes.

The ordinary human being is in control of his destiny. All that nature provides are paths in our lives and we choose the path we travel by. We decide the path. What drives us into taking one fork or another is vasana, the smell that the spirit carries. It is the subtle imprint of our past actions, samskaras and karmas. It is not definitive or predestined.

We have the choice to redefine that vasana, that smell, into a stink or perfume. It is in our hands only. Whether we wish to travel in the same merry-go-round or we decide to break out and walk free is our decision.

Ramakrishna beautifully says that the soul travels from one body to another like we move from one room to another. When He left His physical body, his wife Sarada Devi was about to remove her jewels. (Traditional Hindu families never allow a widow to wear jewels, especially the mangala sutra, the thread signifying marital status as well as bracelets.)

Just as she was about to remove the mangala sutra, Ramakrishna appeared and told her not to remove it. He said, 'Where have I gone? Just to another room. Don't remove your jewels.'

From that time till her end, Sarada Devi followed His words. This may seem easier today. But in those days, in an orthodox Hindu family in a small village, it was not so. She was highly courageous.

Someone who leaves all social conditioning, who sheds all samskaras in his causal layer, moves from body to body as easily as moving from one room to another.

We create big buildings. We accumulate a good bank balance. We have friends. By this time, while we start living, suddenly death appears before us. We fear death only because it takes everything away. If we are unattached, if our causal layer is not filled with samskaras, if we are not clutched by social conditioning, we will not fear death. We know it is like moving from one room to another.

As Krishna says elsewhere, 'It is like changing one piece of dress for another.'

In one of his parables, Ramakrishna says:

An ascetic who was deep into tantric practices went into a forest to worship Divine Mother. He placed all the ritualistic instruments around him and started worship. A tiger roaming that forest attacked and killed him. A passerby saw this and quickly climbed a tree to save himself.

Once the tiger had left, this man climbed down and out of curiosity sat near the corpse and started praying. Suddenly the Divine Mother appeared and told him that she was pleased with his sadhana, spiritual practice, and that he could ask for any boon.

The surprised man asked, 'Mother, the other man was working hard on his worship. Yet, You allowed him to be killed. I just came by and sat down where he had left, and prayed to You. You have now blessed me. Why?'

Devi said to him, 'For many births before this you have been my devotee and you came here not by accident, but by the samskaras and vasanas of your past. I appeared before you as a result.'

The samskaras of this life are the result of prarabdha karma, the mindset, along with the spirit from the vasanas of the past birth that are carried into this birth. It is always a mix of pain and pleasure.

Q: Master, you say conditioning makes us do what we do. Isn't there a built-in programming of the human mind-body system that dictates what we do?

This question needs to be answered at many levels. Let me be brief.

Science earlier believed that the brain developed on its own as the body grew. They assumed that as far as normal physiological factors were concerned, a person grew the same way whether he was brought up in one environment or another.

Some years ago they uncovered a teenager in a Los Angeles suburb locked up in a room. Her parents, for whatever reasons, brought her up in seclusion and never let her out. When released, she would not walk, talk, nor did she understand anyone. I believe she finally died ten years later. Neurosurgeons who performed the autopsy found that many parts of her brain had withered away.

It is now understood that the connection between brain cells, the synaptic connections, depends upon how that part of the brain is used. The brain comes with millions, possibly billions, of potential connections. These connections are made if that part of the brain is used. Walking and movements activate some connections. Speaking, hearing and other sensory inputs activate some of these connections. In the case of this girl, many connections were never used and therefore never activated.

Science recognizes that whatever the innate potential of the body-mind is, conditioning allows that potential to be exploited. Whether it is done in what we consider a positive or negative way depends upon local culture and upbringing. The body-mind system as it exists at birth takes care of some autonomous activities, yet even these depend upon factors of nurture, such as food, shelter, care, etc.

That is why there is nothing predetermined. Yes, the last desire of our previous body dictates the environment in which our next body is born. Beyond that, it is a matter of probability, not certainty, as to how evolution of that body turns out.

Not surprisingly, a quantum physicist understands and agrees with this. Science today knows that all events are probabilistic, and not determined by so-called laws of nature. Nature just is. It has no laws. It is beyond laws.

You Are Your Samskaras

15.9 The living entity, the spirit, leaves one body, takes some other body and gets new eyes, ears, nose, tongue and sensing body according to the samskaras it had in its causal layer and enjoys the new mental setup.

15.10 Fools can neither understand how a living entity can quit his body nor what sort of a body he enjoys under the spell of gunas, the

attributes and moods of the nature. Only those whose eyes are trained by knowledge can see these things.

'The living entity, the spirit, leaves one body, takes another body and gets new eyes, ears, nose, tongue and sensing body according to the samskaras it had in its causal layer and enjoys the new mental setup.'

Here Krishna reveals another secret. He says 'You create a body according to the samskaras in the causal layer.'

There is a Hindu science called samudriga lakshana sastra, the technique of studying body features*.* By observing our physical body structure, experts can read and reveal our mental setup. They know the relationship between mind and body.

Krishna says that we create our sensory organs, according to samskaras in our causal layer. Krishna says that living entities create srotram, chakshu, sparshanam cha rasanam ghraanameva (all five senses) by the mind or mental setup. This happens not only when we take another body. Everyday when we wake up from deep sleep, our senses are recreated. If we change our mental setup, within a short time, our face changes.

Our 'mind' is the intelligence spread all over our body. It is the intelligence that resides in our cells. Each cell carries genetic intelligence. Body and mind are not separate entities. It is just body-mind or mind-body, one system. Within this mind-body system, scientists say that every moment of your life thousands of cells die and thousands of new cells are created. This is a constant process that nature, the universal Intelligence, dictates. It does not happen because of us; it happens in spite of us.

In a period of a little under two years, every part of our body, every cell in our body, gets renewed. Our body as it was a year ago is not the body it is today. Our present body is not the body it will be a year from now. This is not fiction; it is a proven scientific fact.

Then why do we behave the same way as we have for years? Why do illnesses plague us for years, even though the cells are no longer the same?

Each cell as it dies, leaves behind a memory that the newly created cell follows. That is the samskara within us. The samskara ensures the continuation of a pattern despite complete changes in the mind-body system. This samskara is more powerful than the rest of the mind-body system. It decides and drives.

The deep sleep we go into everyday is a rehearsal of our death process. We die and are reborn. Our subtle body leaves the gross body and returns reenergized if we allow it to. It is in our hands to maximize this process of rejuvenation that automatically happens everyday.

Through meditation we can clear our samskaras and be reborn. We can change our features, our character and

behavior, all by reprogramming our samskaras.

That is why people radiate grace after they start meditation. Beauty is created by make- up. Grace is radiated by meditation. Grace makes the occupant feel at home. It soothes the atmosphere. Beauty creates excitement. Beauty moves the other person into rajas (restlessness). Grace creates calmness, satva. Grace puts the other person in energy. Beauty disturbs.

People reminisce about great Masters like Ramana Maharshi and say that He imparted wisdom through silence. It is the enlightened Master's grace that penetrates the other person's energy and changes that person's samskaras.

All that we need to do in an enlightened Master's presence is just be, be open and silent and allow Master's grace to penetrate us. There is nothing that we need to do. Master's grace does whatever is needed.

One version of the great Hindu epic Ramayana says that when princess Sita, the leading lady of the epic, entered the court of King Janaka, her father, all the great kings, monks and mystics stood up automatically. This was not protocol. The grace she radiated caused this response in them. Beauty can create only temptation in the other person. Only grace can create respect. The grace radiating from Sita's being made everybody stand up.

Zen Buddhism says if we can walk on the lawn without killing the grass or creating a path by our footsteps, we are eligible for sannyas. I doubted this. I thought it was impossible. After all, the whole body weight is there. How can grass bear such a load and not leave imprints?

Once I went on a safari in South Bharat. I sat on an elephant and the caretaker came along with me. It was evening. It became dark. The caretaker had no torch or light. I asked him how he would find his way back home. He replied, 'I created a path by my daily walk that I can follow even in darkness.'

I asked about the elephant because it traveled with him everyday. He said, 'The elephant's feet do not create a path. The elephant and other animals do not destroy grass as they walk over it.' I started calculating the load exerted by one foot of the elephant. At the least, it works out to four times that of an average man. However, it did not create a path. It did not kill a single blade of grass. In spite of the physical mass, there was no damage to the environment.

That is why Zen Buddhism says we are eligible for sannyas only when we walk on the lawn without killing a blade of grass. The negativity, arrogance, violence, negative samskaras in our causal layer makes us feel heavy on earth. If we feel heavy around our navel area, we carry negative samskaras. The feeling of heaviness is not connected to our weight. It is due to imprints in our inner space. A person who feels light radiates grace from his being and he never creates a path on a lawn. He never kills a blade of grass by his walk.

Zen says we are a spiritually evolved soul only when

our feet do not create a path, when we float while we walk. We do not go against nature.

Man is the only animal who has gone against nature.

A small story:

A man wanted to do away with his wife and her pet cat. In Bharat, there is no way to divorce one's wife. So he decided to get rid of the cat. He took the cat ten miles away in his car, dropped it off and returned home. Just as he entered his house, the cat also arrived. Next day he took the cat and traveled forty minutes away. He reached a thick forest he had never seen before. He abandoned the cat there.

He started his return trip. Even after one hour, he was unable to find his way home. He phoned his wife and asked, 'Is the cat home?' His wife replied that the cat had just returned. The man said, 'Please ask the cat how to get home. I can't find my way back.'

Since they are one with nature, animals can trace the way more easily than humans. A human being is the only one who has gone against nature, who has lost his way.

Here Krishna says we create our senses according to our samskaras. Not only when we die and take birth, but also we redesign our senses to suit our samskaras everyday when we get up. If we wake up with the right mental setup, we will have our senses accordingly and for the whole day we can enjoy it. If on the other hand, we get up with negativity, we suffer.

The few moments immediately after we wake up are crucial. Whatever we feel will be reflected the rest of the day. If we radiate joy, our whole day will be joyful. If we are irritable, our whole day will be a mess.

Sufi Masters practice a beautiful meditation everyday. Just as they wake up, when their subtle body is settling into their gross body, they practice this meditation.

While still lying down and with eyes closed, run your hands over your head saying with great awareness and belief, 'I love my head and hair. They are so beautiful. I am so grateful to the Universe for having given me such a beautiful head and hair.'

Continue throughout the rest of your body. Touch each limb, each part of your body with great love. Express love to that part, express appreciation to that part, to its beauty and grace and express gratitude to the Universe for giving you such a beautiful body-mind.

Continue throughout your body down to your feet and toes. Finish by touching your toes with great love and feeling, 'I love my toes. They are so beautiful. I am grateful to the Universe for giving me such beautiful toes.'

Do this with awareness everyday at least for twenty-one days. You will be amazed at the changes that happen within your mind-body. You develop grace and equally important, you learn to love yourself, which means that you can love others without difficulty.

Krishna further says adhishthayaa manas chaayam vishayaan upasevate, the type of senses we create determines the type of sensory objects we enjoy. If we create positive senses, we enjoy a positive life. If we create negative senses, we suffer a negative life. The type of senses we create determines what type of objects or pleasure attracts us and we experience that.

Our senses, intelligence and our mind-body system create the energy field around us. This energy field attracts similar energy fields. If we are negative, if our perceptions are negative, we attract people with negative mindsets and descend into a vicious cycle. However, if we convert negativity into positive emotions and perceptions, we attract like-minded, positive people.

This is extremely important in spiritual progress. It is easy to make progress and evolve when we are with a Master; however, we can fall deeply into a rut once we are away from the Master's blissful presence. Doubts grab us and negativities creep in unnoticed. We then get into the company of similar people and the result is chaos.

Sankara says, 'satsangatve nissangatvam.' Good company, company of like-minded people who seek the Truth, helps us become unattached. This is the starting point and it is crucial. That is why Buddha created the sangha, the institution, and Christ created the group of disciples to carry the torch. This institution is often as important, if not more, than the teachings of the Master. The institution is the fuel that keeps the Truth burning and alive.

That is why I am keen to create ashrams or communities where like-minded people can live together and grow in spirituality. The energy created in this process cannot be created in the external world. We can be idealistic and say that we can meditate anywhere; however, in reality spirituality thrives either in aloneness or in like-minded communities. Like energies attract one another and enhance one another.

Krishna provides a wonderful punch line in the middle of this chapter.

'Fools,' He says. Krishna uses the Sanskrit word mudhaha that means 'fool.' Fools can neither understand how a living entity can quit his body nor what sort of a body he enjoys under the spell of guna, the attributes and moods of the nature. Only those whose eyes are trained by knowledge can see these things.

The first thought with which we get up from our bed plays a major role in our enjoyment throughout the day. What is our first thought usually? First we feel awakened. We feel our body. Then it may be the fear that we must go to our office or it may be the greed to finish some work. At the stroke of the thought, fear or greed, our body jumps out of bed. We catch our body with fear or greed.

Krishna says that if we catch our body with fear or greed, we attract more and more fear or greed throughout the whole day.

There are many gates to enter the body. Never enter through the fear or greed gate. Get up with a spiritual thought. Remember your Master or God to whom you are more attached. Practice it consciously for a few days. Then it will become your routine. Don't catch your body with fear or greed; you will attract more and more greed or fear.

Let your first thought be spiritual. Remember your Master or God or anything divine and thank Him. Thank Him for the extended life. Everyday that you wake up is an extension to your life on planet Earth. Thank Divinity for the grace, for the extension.

Waking up from bed is not our birthright. Of course, birth itself is not our right. It is a pure gift of Existence. Be grateful to the Divine for this day and extension here.

If we wake up from bed with spiritual thoughts, that Consciousness stays with us the whole day. If we are made to get up from bed by material thoughts, we start our day with irritation. The entire day we carry the same irritating mood.

When we are in deep sleep, we are in touch with the causal layer. While waking up, we travel along the other three layers and reach the physical body. The three layers are like a shopping mall with various samskaras. According to our causal layer, we pick up the related samskara and catch our physical body and design our senses accordingly.

Just for twenty-one days, wake up with a spiritual thought and check your face. It will have a change. Your eyes will have a new look.

I am not putting forward a theory. I have experienced this. A few hundred thousand people around the world practice my words. From that authority, I tell you, this is a vibrant technique.

Don't catch the body with tamas or rajas (depression or restlessness). If you get up with greed or fear, you design a body that radiates greed or fear and thereby attracts incidents that put you in greed or fear.

When you travel from causal layer to physical body, pick up satva (peaceful or blissful) samskaras. Have a spiritual thought as first thought. Think of your Master or God or anything that gives you a spiritual memory. That is why in Bharat, ancient mystics tell us to meditate early in the morning. At least for a few seconds be in a blissful mood. Your inner space will be fresh and new.

Krishna says, 'Only those whose eyes are trained by knowledge can see the truth of this science. The whole thing is before you.' He says fools cannot understand and only those with eyes of knowledge, jnana chakshu, can see. The choice of being a fool or a man with eyes of knowledge is left to us. The choice is completely ours.

Q: Master, you talked about the importance of ashram

communities in spiritual development. What about people who cannot live in such communities? Can they progress?

Not everyone in ashrams becomes enlightened. Conversely, there is no condition that one must live in an ashram to become enlightened. Enlightenment is our natural state. We just need to understand and accept it.

It is therefore important to understand what stands in the way of this realization. If we are enlightened, why don't we feel that? Why don't we feel we are God? Why don't we feel that we are a part of this Universe? Why don't we feel the Universe will take care of us without any effort on our part?

We create a barrier between us and the Universe. We feel we are separate. We are like the wave that thinks that it is not part of the ocean. Time and time again, the wave is consumed into the ocean and rises again; yet it feels separated. We rise from this Universe and we return to this Universe and yet we feel separate.

We reinforce this feeling of separation by forming attachments. We form attachments to people, objects and events and build walls between us and others, as well as between us and our true nature. As long as we live in the world of materialism, which is built on the foundations of such attachment, it is difficult to break away. We create reasons for these attachments. A mother says, 'I need to care for my children'; an employer says, 'I need to look after my employees'; a leader says, 'I need to direct my followers.' These are games we play to postpone the reality. All these happen automatically within the groups that we define as well as all around in the expanded world around us.

An ashram, a spiritual community, allows us to let go of these attachments. The presence of a Master and the company of like-minded people direct us away from external sense-based attachments. We move from attachment to the external world to attachment to the Master. With the Master's guidance, we learn to let go of that attachment as well.

An ashram does not insulate us from realities of the world. In our ashrams, members are assigned responsibilities of dealing with the world. They learn to be financially savvy and they are trained in skills ranging from photography and computers, to writing and sculpting. Yet, all the time they are underpinned by the understanding of learning to live without expectations of results and without attachments.

This is what Sankara means when he says that good company focused on the Ultimate Reality, satsang, leads to nonattachment; nonattachment leads to no desires; no desires leads to an undisturbed mind; and an undisturbed mind leads to liberation.

The ashram community is a good place to start the journey.

Awareness, Not Achievement

15.11 The serious practitioner of Yoga, with an understanding of his Self, can see all this clearly.

But those who do not have an understanding of the Self, however much they try, cannot see.

15.12 The light of the Sun, the light of the Moon and the light of fire, all their radiance is also from Me.

15.13 Entering into Earth, I support all beings with My energy; becoming the watery Moon, I nourish all plant life.